He had seen the letter almost on the first moment of his entering the room, with that vague, half-terrified comprehension which we may imagine in the brain of the bull when the sun-light flashes on the sword of the matadore.
He approached it now, and read the superscription: “Richard Leslie, Esq. Important.”
He opened it, and a number of bank notes came out. These he laid on one side, took the letter that was with them, and began to read.
He read the letter, not as if he were reading a letter, but the face of some scoundrel he had dragged by the ears into the zone of lamplight. He envisaged it, took whole sentences in en bloc. He read first at the end, then in the middle, then at the beginning.
“And now good-bye for ever. Oh, Dick, don’t think badly of me for this; I have only done what was right.
“When you get this I shall be gone. I am leaving by the La France to meet George.
“I leave you money. Half what I have is yours; remember we are cousins, and ought to help one another.
“Oh, Dick! Dick! I can’t do what you want. I am not thinking of myself but of my people. Imagine the disgrace and ruin it would bring them. My dear old father, it would kill him.”