Part 84 (2/2)

”But I saw the letter, dear; I had it my hand.”

”Did you read it?” asked Julia, trembling now like an aspen, and fluttering like a bird.

”No, but I read the address, and the date inside, and I saw the handwriting; and I was offered the letter, but papa told me it was full of abuse of him, so I declined* to read it; however, I will get it for _you._”

* This was one of those involuntary inaccuracies which creep into mortal statements.

Mrs. Dodd thanked her warmly; but asked her if she could not in the meantime give some idea of the contents.

”Oh yes, Mrs. Dodd: papa read me out a great deal of it. He was in Paris, but just starting for London: and he demanded his money and his accounts. You know papa is one of his trustees.”

”Well, but,” said Mrs. Dodd, ”there was nothing--nothing about----?”

”Oh yes, there was,” said Jane, ”only I--well then, for dear Julia's sake--the letter said, 'What wonder the son of a sharper should prove a traitor? _You_ have stolen her money and _I_ her affections, and'--oh, I can't, I can't.” And Jane Hardie began to cry.

Mrs. Dodd embraced her like a mother, and entered into her filial feelings: Mrs. Dodd had never seen her so weak, and, therefore, never thought her so amiable. Thus occupied they did not at first observe how these tidings were changing Julia.

But presently looking up, they saw her standing at her full height on fire with wrath and insulted pride.

”Ah, you have brought me comfort,” she cried. ”Mamma, I shall hate and scorn this man some day, as much as I hate and scorn myself now for every tear I have shed for him.”

They tried to calm her, but in vain; a new gust of pa.s.sion possessed the ardent young creature and would have vent. She reddened from bosom to brow, and the scalding tears ran down her flaming cheeks, and she repeated between her clenched teeth, ”My veins are not filled with skim-milk, I can tell you: you have seen how I can love, you shall see how I can hate.” And with this she went haughtily out of the room, not to expose the pa.s.sion which overpowered her.

Mrs. Dodd took advantage of her absence to thank Jane for her kindness, and told her she had also received some letters by this morning's post, and thought it would be neither kind on her part nor just to conceal their purport from her. She then read her a letter from Mrs. Beresford, and another from Mr. Grey, in answer to queries about the L. 14,000.

Sharpe, I may as well observe, was at sea; Bayliss drowned.

Mrs. Beresford knew nothing about the matter.

Mr. Grey was positive Captain Dodd, when in command, had several thousand pounds in his cabin; Mrs. Beresford's Indian servant had been detected trying to steal it, and put in irons: believed the lady had not been told the cause--out of delicacy! and Captain Roberts had liberated him. As to whether the money had escaped the wreck--if on Captain Dodd's person, it might have been saved; but if not, it was certainly lost: for Captain Dodd to his knowledge had run on deck from the pa.s.senger's cabin the moment the s.h.i.+p struck, and had remained there till she went to pieces; and everything was washed out of her.

”Our own opinion,” said Mrs. Dodd, ”I mean Edward's and mine, is now, that the money was lost in the s.h.i.+p; and you can tell your papa so if you like.”

Jane thanked her, and said she thought so too: and what a sad thing it was.

Soon after this Julia returned, pale and calm as a statue, and sat down humbly beside Jane. ”Oh, pray with me,” she said: ”pray that I may not hate, for to hate is to be wicked; and pray that I may not love, for to love is to be miserable.”

Mrs. Dodd retired, with her usual tact and self-denial.

Then Jane Hardie, being alone with her friend, and full of sorrow, sympathy, and faith, found words of eloquence almost divine to raise her.

With these pious consolations Julia's pride and self-respect now co-operated. Relieved of her great terror, she felt her insult to her fingers' ends: ”I'll never degrade myself so far as to pine for another lady's lover,” she said. ”I'll resume my duties in another sphere, and try to face the world by degrees. I am not quite alone in it; I have my mother still--and my Redeemer.”

Some tears forced their way at these brave, gentle words. Jane gave her time.

<script>