“Why?” sharply.
“Oh, it was a terrible mésalliance. Your father ought never to have married that woman, and your friends should never have allowed you to be raised as the companion of her child. The gulf between you is wide, and there is really no relationship, you know,” he said, proudly.
Molly looked at him strangely without reply. He was puzzled by her eyes—there was in them such a sudden look of anguish and pride, with something like reproach. He could not understand it, and asked himself if she meant to uphold the cause of that odious woman.
But here they were at the post-office, and there was a letter for Miss Louise Barry. She caught it eagerly from his hand.
“It is from my sis—my step-sister, and I know she has written for me to come home!” Molly cried, excitedly.
CHAPTER IX.
Molly rode very fast on returning, and she was so quiet that Cecil Laurens regarded her knit brows and pursed-up lips in surprise.
“You are leading me a sort of John Gilpin race, Miss Barry. What is the matter with you?” he said.
“I am impatient to read my letter,” she replied in a curt voice.
They were outside the limits of the town now, and riding up the mountain road beneath tall overarching trees that lined the road on either side. He said, kindly: