f her doubts rushing on her mind with a
force and rapidity that sickened her.

The misfortunes of Mrs. Fitzgerald, the unfortunate issue to the passion
of Jane, were trifles in the estimation of Mrs. Wilson, compared to the
discovery of Denbigh's unworthiness. She revolved in her mind his conduct
on various occasions, and wondered how one who could behave so well in
common, could thus yield to temptation on a particular occasion. His
recent attempts, his hypocrisy, however, proved that his villany was
systematic, and she was not weak enough to hide from herself the evidence
of his guilt, or of its enormity. His interposition between Emily and
death, she attributed now to natural courage, and perhaps in some measure
to chance; but his profound and unvarying reverence for holy things, his
consistent charity, his refusing to fight, to what were they owing? And
Mrs. Wilson mourned the weakness of human nature, while she acknowledged
to her self, there might be men, qualified by nature, and even disposed by
reason and grace, to prove ornaments to religion and the world, who fell
beneath the maddening influence of their besetting sins. The superficial
and interested vices of Egerton vanished before these awful and deeply
seated offences of Denbigh, and the correct widow saw at a glance, that he
was the last man to be intrusted with the happiness of her niece; but how
to break this heartrending discovery to Emily was a new source of
uneasiness to her, and the carriage stopped at the door of the lodge, ere
she had determined on the first step required of her by duty.

Her brother handed her out, and, filled with the dread that Denbigh had
availed himself of the opportunity of her absence to press his suit with
Emily, she eagerly inquired after him. She was rejoiced to hear he had
returned with John for a fowling-piece, and together they had gone in
pursuit of game, although she saw in it a convincing proof that a desire
to avoid Mrs. Fitzgerald, and not indisposition, had induced him to leave
her.--As a last alternative, she resolved to have the pocket-book returned
to him in her presence, in order to see if he acknowledged it to be his
property; and, accordingly, she instructed her own man to hand it to him
while at dinner, simply saying he had lost it.

The open and unsuspecting air with which her niece met Denbigh on his
return gave Mrs. Wilson an additional shock, and she could hardly command
herself sufficiently to extend