"Very well," he rejoined, with some wistfulness, and turned with his usual impetuosity towards the door. "I will go to Dr. Sellick's, then, at once, that I may receive your sister's communication the sooner. Tell her every moment will be an hour till it is in my hands."
"Doris will carry it to you as soon as it is dark. Had we known you were going to stop here, she might have had it ready now. As it is, look for it as I have said, and may it bring you no deeper pain than the mystery of our seclusion has already done. Hermione has noble qualities, and if her temper had never been injured by the accident which befell her in her infancy, there might have been no call for Doris' errand to-night."
"I will remember that," said he, and left the house with the confident smile of a man who feels it impossible to doubt the woman towards whom his heart has gone out in the fullest love.
When the door was shut behind him, Hermione came stealing again down-stairs.
"Does he—is he—prepared to receive the letter?" she asked.
Emma nodded. "I promised that it should go as soon as it is dusk."
"Then send Doris to me in half an hour; and do not try to see me again to-night. I must bear its long and tedious hours alone." And for a second time Hermione disappeared from the room.
In half an hour Doris was sent upstairs. She found Hermione standing in the centre of her room with a thick packet in her hand. She was very pale and her eyes blazed strangely. As Doris advanced she held out the packet with a hand that shook notwithstanding all her efforts to render it firm.
"Take this," she said; "carry it to where Mr. Etheridge stays when here, and place it in his hands yourself, just as you did a former note I entrusted to you."
Doris, with a flush, seized the letter, her face one question, but her lips awed from speaking by the expression of her mistress' face.