“There’s something wrong? Ah! it’s Eustace; I know it is!”
“Nothing wrong with him more than we knew of already. He is still a prisoner; but, of course, not at Monmouth, or he’d have been released. They have taken him away from there, as Richard thinks, to Goodrich Castle.”
There was that in her manner, with the words and their tone of utterance, which led to a suspicion of either subterfuge or reticence. And Vaga so suspecting, with another searching look into her eyes, exclaimed,—
“You’ve not told me all. There’s something in that letter you fear to communicate. You need not, Sab. I’ll try to be brave. Better for me to know the worst. Let me read it.”
Thus appealed to the elder sister gave way. The thing she desired to conceal must become known sooner or later. Perhaps as well, if not better, at once.
Tearing off that portion of the sheet on which were the words of tenderness concerning only herself, she passed the other into the hands of her sister, saying,—
“All’s there that interests you, Vag; and don’t let it alarm you. Remember that wounds are always made more of than—”
“Wounded!” came the interrupting cry from Vaga’s lips, intoned with agony. “He’s wounded—it may be to death! I shall go to Goodrich. If he die, I die with him!”