"Shall I tell her? Ought I to tell her?" Jessie thought, looking into the bright face of the young girl.
Then as she remembered how really good-natured William was, and that after all he might make a kind husband, she resolved to throw no cloud over the happiness of her friend, and congratulated her as cordially as it was possible for her to do. But Charlotte detected the absence of something in her manner, and imputing it to a feeling of chagrin at having lost Mr. Bellenger, she soon brought her visit to a close, and hastened home, telling her grandmother that she believed Jessie Graham was terribly disappointed, for she was as white as a ghost, and could scarcely keep from crying.
Meantime William, in a most singular state of mind, tried to play the part of a devoted lover to Charlotte,—avoided an interview with Jessie,—received quite indifferently the congratulations of his friends, and spent the remainder of his time in hating Walter, who, he believed, stood between him and Jessie Graham, just as he was sure he stood between him and his rich grandmother.
"I'll torment him while I can," he thought. "I'll make him think for a time, at least, that Jessie is lost," and sitting down he wrote the carefully-worded letter which had sent Walter so suddenly from home. "There," said he, as he read it over, "he can infer what he pleases. I don't say it's Jessie I'm going to marry; but he can think so, if he likes, and I don't envy him his cogitations."
William could not have devised a way of wounding Walter more deeply than the letter had wounded him, or of affecting Jessie more sensibly than she was affected, when she heard that Walter had gone to California.
"Not gone!" she cried, when her father brought to her the news. "Not gone, without a word for me. Oh, father, it was cruel! Didn't he leave a message for you?"
"Yes, read it if you choose," and Mr. Graham passed to her the letter which had greatly puzzled him.
Was it possible he had been deceived? Was it Charlotte Reeves, and not his daughter, whom Walter Marshall loved? It would seem so, and yet he could not be so mistaken; Walter must have been misinformed as to the bride. Jessie, perhaps, could explain; and he stood watching her face as she read the letter.
At first it turned very red, then spotted, and then, as the horrible truth burst upon her, it became as white as marble, and stretching out her arms she moaned:
"Oh, father, I never thought that he loved Charlotte Reeves. I most wish I were dead;" and with another cry, Jessie lay sobbing in her father's arms. Very gently he tried to soothe her; and then, when she was better, laid her upon the sofa, and kneeling beside her, kissed away the tears which rolled down her cheeks so fast.