; therefore she
got him out of the way. The world might have become interested in you,
might have taken your side; she beguiled your father, in his blind
passion, to calumniate you, to ruin your reputation, and to expose you
to the contempt of the world. Still you might have wished to secure
a protector, you might have found one. She placed by your side her
wretched tool, her spy, a forger, a criminal whom she knew to be able
of doing things from which even an accomplished galley-slave would have
shrunk with disgust and horror: I mean Maxime de Brevan."

The very excess, of eruption had restored a part of her energy to
Henrietta. She said, therefore,--

"Alas, _sir_! have I not told you, on, the contrary, that Daniel himself
had confided me to the care of M. de Brevan? Have I not told you"--

The old dealer smiled almost contemptuously, and then continued,--

"What does that prove? Nothing but the skill of M. de Brevan in carrying
out Sarah Brandon's orders. In order to get the more completely the
mastery over you, he began by obtaining the mastery over M. Champcey.
How he succeeded in doing this, I do not know. But we shall know it when
we want to know it; for we are going to find out every thing. Thus Sarah
was, through M. de Brevan, kept informed of all your thoughts, of all
your hopes, of _every_ word you wrote to M. Champcey, and of all he said
in reply; for you need not doubt he did answer, and they suppressed the
letters, just as they, very probably, intercepted all of your letters
which you did not yourself carry to the post-office. Still, as long as
you were living under your father's roof, Sarah could do nothing against
your life. She resolved, therefore, to force you to flee; and those mean
persecutions of M. Elgin served their purpose. You thought, and perhaps,
they think, that bandit really wanted your hand. Undeceive yourself.
Your enemies knew your character too well to hope that you would ever
break your word, and become faithless to M. Champcey. But they were bent
upon handing you over to M. de Brevan. And thus, poor child! you were
handed over to him. Maxime had as little idea of marrying you as Sir
Thomas; he was quite prepared, when he dared to approach you with open
arms, to be rejected with disgust. But he had received orders to add
the horror of his persecutions to the horror of your isolation and your
destitution.

"For he was quite sure, the scoundrel! that the secret of your
sufferings wou