TFORT.--"Alas! how bitterly she must have suffered--and how
young she was! But you are right; I cannot speak to Sophy of her mother,
the subject is connected with so much sorrow. But I told her 'that
she should know all soon,' and she said, with a sweet and melancholy
patience, 'When my poor grandfather will be by to hear; I can wait.'"
GEORGE.--"But is Lionel, with his quick intellect and busy imagination,
equally patient? Does he not guess at the truth? You have told him that
you do meditate a project which affects Guy Darrell, and required his
promise not to divulge to Darrell his visits in this house."
LADY MONTFORT--"He knows that Sophy's paternal grandfather was William
Losely. From your uncle he heard William Losely's story, and--"
GEORGE.--"My uncle Alban?"
LADY MOSTFORT.--"Yes; the Colonel was well acquainted with the elder
Losely in former days, and spoke of him to Lionel with great affection.
It seems that Lionel's father knew him also, and thoughtlessly involved
him in his own pecuniary difficulties. Lionel was not long a visitor
here before he asked me abruptly if Mr. Waife's real name was not
Losely. I was obliged to own it, begging him not at present to question
me further. He said then, with much emotion, that he had an hereditary
debt to discharge to William Losely, and that he was the last person who
ought to relinquish belief in the old man's innocence of the crime
for which the law had condemned him, or to judge him harshly if the
innocence were not substantiated. You remember with what eagerness he
joined in your search, until you positively forbade his interposition,
fearing that should our poor friend hear of inquiries instituted by one
whom he could not recognise as a friend, and might possibly consider
an emissary of his son's, he would take yet greater pains to conceal
himself. But from the moment that Lionel learned that Sophy's
grandfather was William Losely, his manner to Sophy became yet more
tenderly respectful. He has a glorious nature, that young man! But did
your uncle never speak to you of William Losely?"
"No. I am not surprised at that. My uncle Alban avoids 'painful
subjects.' I am only surprised that he should have revived a painful
subject in talk to Lionel. But I now understand why, when Waife first
heard my name, he seemed affected, and why he so specially enjoined
me never to mention or describe him to my friends and relations. Then
Lionel knows Losely's story, but not
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