"Lost! lost," cried Oakley. "Yes, you—even you, hopeful as you were, and hopeful as you would fain have made me—even you, now that you know all, feel that she is lost. God, indeed, only can help me now."
"No, Mr. Oakley," said the aunt, rallying, "I will not yet trust to appearances, although I own that they are bad. I will come to no conclusion until I have seen Arabella, and got the truth from her. It is quite clear that there is some secret between the two young creatures. It is quite clear that there is something going on that we know nothing of, and to speculate upon which may only involve us in an inextricable labyrinth of conjectures. I say, there is some secret, but it may not be a guilty one."
"Not—not guilty?"
"No, Mr. Oakley, there are many degrees of indiscretion to pass through ere the gulf of guilt is reached at last. I have faith in Arabella—I have faith in Johanna; and even now, admitting for a moment the truth of what that man whom you brought with you here, reports, Johanna may only have to be blamed for folly."
"Do—do you think he did so see her?"
"I doubt it much."
"Mother," said a lad of fifteen, coming hastily into the room. "Mother I—"
He paused upon seeing Mr. Oakley there, and stammered out some apology—
"He had only come to tell his mother that a whole suit of his clothes were missing from his room and that he could find them nowhere, and he could not make it out; and one of his hats was gone too, and a pair of shoes, and—"
Old Oakley fell back in his chair with a groan.