“Done?” cried Linny; “wounded me where you knew my heart was sore; looked upon my every act with suspicion.”
“No, my child,” he said quietly, as he watched the pretty, wilful little thing more in grief than anger. “You know how happy we have been, these last few weeks, since you have had confidence in me, and listened to my words.”
“Happy?” she cried piteously, and with her hand upon her heart.
“Yes,” he said; “happy till this letter came to-day—a letter that has swept all your promises to the winds, and sown dissension between us. Once more, will you show me the letter?”
“Once more,” cried Linny passionately, “no! You assume too much. Even if you were my father, you could do no more.”
“I stand to you, my dear child, in the place of your dead father. Your honour is as dear to me as it would have been to him.”
“My honour!” echoed Linny. “Stephen, you degrade me, by talking in this way before a comparative stranger.”
“Antony Grace is not a comparative stranger,” said Hallett quietly. “If he were your own brother he could not have acted better to us both. I speak out before him, because I look to Antony, boy though he be, to help me to watch over you and protect you, since you are so weak.”
“To act as your spy?”
“No,” he said sadly, “we will not degrade ourselves by acting as spies, but you force it upon me, Linny, to take stern measures. You refuse to show me this letter?”