"Pooh!" said he, as he just glanced at the mark, "that is
nothing--nothing. Answer my question. Have you--have you met that man
in private?"
"Yes, papa, I have; but I don't think it was wrong."
He sate down now. "Wrong!" he echoed, bitterly. "Not wrong? Well! I
must bear it somehow. Your mother is dead. That's one comfort. It is
true, then, is it? Why, I didn't believe it--not I. I laughed in my
sleeve at their credulity; and I was the dupe all the time!"
"Papa, I cannot tell you all. It is not my secret, or you should
know it directly. Indeed, you will be sorry some time--I have never
deceived you yet, have I?" trying to take one of his hands; but he
kept them tightly in his pockets, his eyes fixed on the pattern of
the carpet before him. "Papa!" said she, pleading again, "have I ever
deceived you?"
"How can I tell? I hear of this from the town's talk. I don't know
what next may come out!"
"The town's talk!" said Molly in dismay. "What business is it of
theirs?"
"Every one makes it their business to cast dirt on a girl's name who
has disregarded the commonest rules of modesty and propriety."
"Papa, you are very hard. Modesty disregarded! I will tell you
exactly what I have done. I met Mr. Preston once,--that evening
when you put me down to walk over Croston Heath,--and there was
another person with him. I met him a second time--and that time by
appointment--nobody but our two selves,--in the Towers' Park. That is
all, papa. You must trust me. I cannot explain more. You must trust
me indeed."
He could not help relenting at her words; there was such truth in the
tone in which they were spoken. But he neither spoke nor stirred for
a minute or two. Then he raised his eyes to hers for the first time
since she had acknowledged the external truth of what he charged her
with. Her face was very white, but it bore the impress of the final
sincerity of death, when the true expression prevails without the
poor disguises of time.
"The letters?" he said,--but almost as if he were ashamed to question
that countenance any further.
"I gave him one letter,--of which I did not write a word,--which, in
fact, I believe to have been merely an envelope, without any writing
whatever inside. The giving that letter,--the two interviews I have
named,--make all the private intercourse I have had with Mr. Preston.
Oh! papa, what have they been saying that has grieved--shocked you so
much?"