"Do you think he knows why she has gone, and why she is going to marry Mr. Bennet?"
"I asked him these very questions, Gilbert; but he said he could not tell me anything. It is all very strange!"
"Very strange!" cried Gilbert. "It is perfectly maddening!"
"Perhaps you had better see your father," suggested Mrs. Eversleigh.
"Yes; I'll go to him at once," said Gilbert.
"You will be gentle and careful, Gilbert!" urged his mother. "More than once lately I have been forced to think the troubles through which your father has recently passed have been almost too much for him. He is all the time in a state of fever both of body and mind. You will not forget that, my son!"
"Certainly not, mother," replied Gilbert.
Eversleigh had expected Gilbert would come to him, but, up to the moment of seeing him, was uncertain how to act.
Gilbert, when he met his father, began by stating he had received an extraordinary letter from Miss Thornton, in which she broke off her engagement with him, and announced her intention of marrying Bennet.
"As soon as I got the letter," Gilbert continued, "I went over to Surbiton to see her, but when I went there I found she had left the house and gone to a friend in Yorkshire. Mother could tell me nothing, so I have come to you to see if you can help me to some understanding of the matter."