vorable impression I may have produced on you, I dare not
inquire. So little capable am I of concealing the vile feelings which
sometimes get the better of me, that Miss Cristel (observe that I mention
her with respect) appears to have felt positive alarm, on your account,
when she looked at me.

"I may tell you, in confidence, that this charming person came to my side
of the cottage, as soon as you had taken your departure, to intercede
with me in your favour. 'If your wicked mind is planning to do evil to
Mr. Roylake,' she wrote in my book, 'either you will promise me to give
it up, or I will never allow you to see me again; I will even leave home
secretly, to be out of your way.' In that strong language she
expressed--how shall I refer to it?--shall I say the sisterly interest
that she felt in your welfare?"

I laid down the letter for a moment. If I had not already reproached
myself for having misjudged Cristel--and if I had not, in that way, done
her some little justice in my own better thoughts--I should never have
recovered my self-respect after reading the deaf man's letter. The good
girl! The dear good girl! Yes: that was how I thought of her, under the
windows of my stepmother's boudoir--while Mrs. Roylake, for all I knew to
the contrary, might be looking down at me, and when Lady Lena, the noble
and beautiful, was coming to dinner!

The letter concluded as follows:

"To return to myself. I gave Miss Cristel the promise on which she had
insisted; and then, naturally enough, I inquired into her motive for
interfering in your favour.

"She frankly admitted that she was interested in you. First: in grateful
remembrance of old times, when you and your mother had been always good
to her. Secondly: because she had found you as kind and as friendly as
ever, now that you were a man and had become the greatest landowner in
the county. There was the explanation I had asked for, at my service.
And, on that, she left me.

"Did I believe her when I was meditating on our interview, alone in my
room? Or did I suspect you of having robbed me of the only consolation
that makes my life endurable?

"No such unworthy suspicion as this was admitted to my mind. With all my
heart, I believe her. And with perfect sincerity, I trust You.

"If your knowledge of me has failed to convince you that there is any
such thing as a better side to my nature, you will no doubt conclude that
this letter is a trick of mine to throw yo