"Yes," Robert answers, his handsome head downcast, his burning eyes painfully averted—"yes, I—I can easily do that, because—because, I shall forget I ever had a sister. Armstrong, Armstrong, you—you understand what I feel, if—if this should prove true. I—I may not be able to speak to you again; but you understand, don't you, that the pain, the disgrace, the wrong that we—that she has brought on your life can never, if I live to be an old man, be entirely wiped from mine? You understand," he continues, with flashing eyes, the veins in his neck swelling with suppressed emotion, "that, if—if either of them crossed my path at this moment, I should have as little compunction in striking them dead at my feet as I should have in crushing out the life of the meanest, most harmless insect that crawls on earth? You—you believe me, don't you?"
"Yes, Robert, I do," he answers, grasping Robert's outstretched hand, feeling for the first time in his life a sense of respect, of esteem almost, for the unfortunate boy.
CHAPTER XXV.
The next morning, when, ill with crying, Pauline opens her swollen eyes, she finds a letter from Robert lying on the table by her bedside. Its contents bring on a fresh outburst of grief that lasts far into the day.
"You are to forget," he writes, "that you ever had an elder sister; you are to blot her out from your life as if she had never been, to remove all traces of her existence from your sight, never to sully your lips by uttering her name, if you wish still to call me brother."
Then he tells her that among the list of passengers that have sailed that morning for Melbourne in the "Chimborazo" they have seen the names of "Mr. and Mrs. Edward Lefroy."
When, late in the afternoon, Pauline creeps down-stairs, she finds the stillness of the grave shrouding the house.
Armstrong has not returned; he does not cross the threshold of Nutsgrove. Lottie has been sent up to Sallymount Farm to spend the day, and most of the servants, with Mrs. Turner's approval, have leave granted during the absence of the master and mistress, who, she elaborately explains, have gone to the seaside for a few weeks' change of air. A futile explanation. They all know, as well as if the news were published in that morning's "Times," that the establishment is broken up for good, and that they will never gather again in cheerful circle round the roomy hearth of the servants' hall, discussing the goings on of the folk upstairs, laying jocular bets as to which of Miss Pauline's lovers will win the day, and as to how long the master will stand Mr. Lefroy's imperious ways, et cætera, and other topics of a like personal but highly interesting nature.