“I thought you 'd say so,—I knew it,” said he, sorrowfully; “but I know better. The dear old voice rang in my heart as I used to hear it when a child, as he said, 'Do you remember me?' To be sure I remembered him, and told him to go and fetch Molly; and his brow darkened when I said this, and he drew back his hand and said, 'You have deserted her,—she is not here!'”
“All this is mere fancy, Godfrey; you have been dreaming of home.”
“Ay,” muttered he, gloomily, “it was but too true; we did desert her, and that was not our bargain, Dolly. It was all the poor fellow asked at our hands,—his last, his only condition. What's that letter you have there?” cried he, impatiently, as Lady Dorothea, in the agitation of the moment, continued to crumple Repton's letter between her fingers.
“A letter I have been reading,” said she, sternly.
“From whom—from whom?” asked he, still more eagerly.
“A letter from Mr. Repton. You shall read it when you are better. You are too weak for all this exertion, God-frey; you must submit—”
“Submit!” broke he in; “the very word he said. You submit yourself to anything, if it only purchase your selfish ease. No, Dolly, no, I am wrong. It was I that said so. I owned to him how unworthily I had acted. Give me that letter, madam. Let me see it,” said he, imperiously.
“When you are more tranquil, Godfrey,—in a fitting state.”
“I tell you, madam,” cried he, fiercely, “this, is no time for trifling or deception. Repton knows all our affairs. If he has written now, it is because matters are imminent. My head is clear now. I can think—I can speak. It is full time Harry should hear the truth. Let him come here.”
“Take a little rest, Godfrey, be it only half an hour, and you shall have everything as you wish it.”