"Yes," said Madelon; "I think it was—yes, I know it was. I remember the letters now. But I have something of hers here, too," she added—"a letter, that I found in the pocket of this dress—this was mamma's once, and it was in the trunk. Shall I fetch it?—it is upstairs."
"Yes, I should like to see it, my dear. You will wonder at all these questions, but, if I am not mistaken, your mother was a very dear friend of mine."
Madelon left the room, and Mrs. Treherne, sitting down at the table, began to arrange her breakfast-cups. Horace was standing with one arm on the mantel-piece, gazing into the fire; he had been silent during this short interview, but as Madelon disappeared,—
"Is she at all like her mother?" he inquired.
"She is like—yes, certainly she is like; her eyes remind me of
Magdalen's—and yet she is unlike, too."
"You must be prepared," said Horace, after a moment's pause, "to find her devoted to her father's memory; and not without reason, I must say, for he was devoted to her, after his own fashion. She thinks him absolute perfection; and, in fact, I believe this escapade of hers to have been entirely founded on precedents furnished by him."
"I think it is the most dreadful thing I ever heard of," said
Mrs. Treherne—"a child of that age alone in such a place!"
"Well, I really don't know," answered Graham, half laughing. "I don't suppose it has done her much mischief; and of this I am quite sure, that she had no idea of there being any more harm in going to a gambling-table than in going for a walk."
"That appears to me the worst part of it, that a child should have been brought up in such ignorance of right and wrong. However, she can be taught differently."
"Certainly; but don't you think the teaching had better come gradually?—it would break her heart, to begin with, to be told her father was not everything she imagines—if indeed she could be made to understand it just yet, which I doubt."