“You don’t blame me then—very much.”
“Well, say not very much; but it’s not very pleasant to have a nephew who makes one believe he’s dead, and a niece who pretends that she has bolted with a scampish Frenchman.”
“Uncle, uncle,” she cried piteously, “You see it has been a terrible upset for me, while as to your poor father—”
“But, uncle, dear, what could I do?”
“Well, when you were writing, you might have said a little more.”
“I wrote what poor Harry forced me to write. What else could I say?”
“You see, it has upset us all so terribly. George—I mean your father—will never forgive you.”
“But you do not put yourself in my place, uncle. Think of how Harry was situated; think of his horror of being taken. Indeed, he was half mad.”
“No; quite, Louy; and you seem to have caught the complaint.”
“I hardly knew what I did. It was like some terrible dream. Harry frightened me then.”