"And my mother—my poor, suffering mother! What can her object be? No dove was ever more blameless than poor, dear mamma!" she said, with tender pathos. "Was she not content with what she had done against me? But I will go at once to papa and tell him everything about her."
"No," I said, trying to hold her with my feeble hand; "he will not believe you."
"Not believe me, Aunt Matty?"
"I fear not—Jessie, don't look so wounded! But he would demand your authority, and you would, of course, give me."
"Not without your permission."
"You would have it; but all might end in her triumph over us both. You remember the letter which came to me, that account of his stewardship? Ask yourself if it was the work of Mr. Lee's own heart."
"No, no, I am sure it was not!"
"Yet it came on the very next day."
"And broke your heart, dear Aunt Matty. I could not understand it. The first lines about money fastened themselves upon me I don't know how. I did not think, in my fright, when Lottie told me that you were ill, about its being a private letter; still I only read that and carried the paper back. What was in the letter I did not know; but I burned it to pacify you."
"The rest was only a kind dismissal from the house, Jessie!"