"I have every reason to believe so. He is with his mother."
Miss Granger sighed profoundly, as much as to say, "He could not be in worse hands."
"And I think, my dear," continued her father, "that the less you trouble yourself about this business the better. Any interference on your part will only annoy me, and may occasion unpleasantness between us. You will go back to Arden, to-morrow, as I intended, with Warman, and one of the men to take care of your luggage. The rest of the establishment will follow in a day or so."
"And you, papa?"
"My plans are uncertain. I shall return to Arden as soon as I can."
"Dear old Arden!" exclaimed Sophia; "how I wish we had never left it! How happy I was for the first four years of my life there!"
This apostrophe Mr. Granger perfectly understood—it meant that, with the advent of Clarissa, happiness had fled away from Sophia's dwelling-place. He did not trouble himself to notice the speech; but it made him angry nevertheless.
"There is a letter for you, papa," said Miss Granger, pointing to a side-table; "a letter which Warman found upstairs."
The lynx-eyed Warman, prying and peering about, had spied out Clarissa's letter to her husband, half hidden among the frivolities on the dressing-table. Mr. Granger pounced upon it eagerly, full of hope. It might tell him all he wanted to know.
It told him nothing. The words were not consistent with guilt, unless Clarissa were the very falsest of women. But had she not been the falsest? Had she not deceived him grossly, unpardonably? Alas, he was already trying to make excuses for her—trying to believe her innocent, innocent of what society calls sin—yes, she might be that. But had he not seen her kneeling beside her lover? Had she not owned that she loved him? She had; and the memory of her words were poison to Daniel Granger.