Never has he appeared to such advantage. Never has he been so thoroughly liked as at this moment. Molly moves as though she would go to him; but Cecil, laying her hand upon her arm, wisely restrains her. What can be said to comfort him, who has lost home, and love, and all?
"It is all a mistake; it cannot be true," says Molly, piteously. "It is a mistake." She looks appealingly at Cecil, who, wise woman that she is, only presses her arm again meaningly, and keeps a discreet silence. To express her joy at the turn events have taken at this time would be gross; though not to express it goes hard with Cecil. She contents herself with glancing expressively at Sir Penthony every now and then, who is standing at the other end of the room.
"I also congratulate you," says Luttrell, coming forward, and speaking for the first time. He is not nearly so composed as Shadwell, and his voice has a strange and stilted sound. He speaks so that Molly and Cecil alone can hear him, delicacy forbidding any open expression of pleasure. "With all my heart," he adds; but his tone is strange. The whole speech is evidently a lie. His eyes meet hers with an expression in them she has never seen there before,—so carefully cold it is, so studiously unloving.
Molly is too agitated to speak to him, but she lifts her head, and shows him a face full of the keenest reproach. Her pleading look, however, is thrown away, as he refuses resolutely to meet her gaze. With an abrupt movement he turns away and leaves the room, and, as they afterward discover, the house.
Meantime, Marcia has torn open her envelope, and read its enclosure. A blotted sheet half covered with her own writing,—the very letter begun and lost in the library last October; that, being found, has condemned her. With a half-stifled groan she lets it flutter to the ground, where it lies humbled in the dust, an emblem of all her falsely-cherished hopes.
Philip, too, having examined his packet, has brought to light that fatal letter of last summer that has so fully convicted him of unlawful dealings with Jews. Twice he reads it, slowly, thoughtfully, and then, casting one quick, withering glance at Marcia (under which she cowers), he consigns it to his pocket without a word.
The play is played out. The new mistress of Herst has been carried away by Cecil Stafford to her own room; the others have dispersed. Philip and Marcia Amherst are alone.
Marcia, waking from her reverie, makes a movement as though she, too, would quit the apartment, but Shadwell, coming deliberately up to her, bars her exit. Laying his hand gently but firmly on her wrist, he compels her to both hear and remain.
"You betrayed me?" he says, between his teeth. "You gave this letter"—producing it—"to my grandfather? I trusted you, and you betrayed me."
"I did," she answers, with forced calmness.