"Yes. Your acknowledgment, in Fanny's name, when you are writing to Mr. Lyon, will be all that he has a right to expect, and all that our daughter should be permitted to give."
"But if we restrict her to so cold a response, and that by second-hand, may she not be tempted to write to him without our knowledge?"
"No, Edward. I will trust her for that," was the unhesitating answer.
"She is very young," said Mr. Markland, as if speaking to himself.
"Oh, yes!" quickly returned his wife. "Years too young for an experience—or, I might say, a temptation—like this. I cannot but feel that, in writing to our child, Mr. Lyon abused the hospitality we extended to him."
"Is not that a harsh judgment, Agnes?"
"No, Edward. Fanny is but a child, and Mr. Lyon a man of mature experience. He knew that she was too young to be approached as he approached her."
"He left it with us, you know, Agnes; and with a manly delicacy that we ought neither to forget nor fail to appreciate."
The remark silenced, but in no respect changed the views of Mrs. Markland; and the conference on Fanny's state of mind closed without any satisfactory result.
The appearance of his daughter on the next morning caused Mr. Markland to feel a deeper concern. The colour had faded from her cheeks; her eyes were heavy, as if she had been weeping; and if she did not steadily avoid his gaze, she was, he could see, uneasy under it.