“She speaks of letting me the farm! I never had the slightest desire to rent the farm, and before I heard the will read, I had not even the slightest idea that Mrs. Clifton designed to leave it to my sister!”
“Ah! Really?” asked Mr. Clifton, ironically.
“Really and truly, and sincerely and positively, I had not.”
“Tautological asseveration is no evidence. Why should she have written to you thus if you had not?”
“How do I know, sir? I tell you I am amazed! And if I did not know, beyond all possibility of doubt, the hand-writing to be Catherine’s, I should say that she did not write, and that she never could have written such a letter.”
“Which means plainly this, that if there did not exist the most positive proof to the contrary, you would fain deny it,” sneered Major Clifton.
“Yes, sir!” answered Carl, boldly. “If the proof positive to my mind, as well as to your own did not exist, I would deny it, and I do deny any personal agency or knowledge about it whatever! I say to you that I am amazed! It is incomprehensible to me how Catherine could have conceived, much less written such a letter! And above all things, it is inexplicable how she should have written so disrespectfully of Mrs. Clifton, whom she loved and venerated so much.”
“Or whom, for certain purposes, she pretended to love and venerate so much.”
“She did, sir! She really did. She was sincere in her esteem and affection. She was sincere in all things.”
“I know she affected rare sincerity.”