“But you never shall know the truth about it,” thought Amber, vindictively, and she resolved to destroy the letter at the first opportunity.
Then, suddenly, she burst into tears again, and Mrs. Grant said, anxiously, to her son:
“Amber is in some deep trouble, and promised to explain all as soon as you arrived.”
He turned quickly to the weeping girl, saying, tenderly:
“What is it that has grieved you so bitterly, my dear girl?”
Unheeding Mrs. Grant’s presence, and with a torrent of tears, Amber threw herself into Cecil’s arms, clinging wildly to him, and sobbing, miserably:
“Grandpapa has turned me out of doors, driven me from home, and I have come to throw myself upon your protection.”
“Turned you out of doors! Good heavens! why has Judge Camden done this cruel thing?” demanded Cecil, wonderingly, and she moaned, despairingly:
“He found out that—that—it was I who loaned you the money to save Bonnycastle, and he—he—struck me, and drove me from home!”