"Why, what is the matter?" said the lady, stoutly; but her red cheeks belied her assumption of innocence.
"Oh, not much," said George, with a bitter sneer. "It is an old story; only I thought you were nobler than the rest of your sex. This letter is to Mr. Griffith Gaunt."
"Well, Sir!" said Kate, with a face of serene and candid innocence.
"And Mr. Griffith Gaunt is a suitor of yours."
"Say, was. He is so no longer. He and I are out. But for that, think you I had even listened to—what you have been saying to me this ever so long?"
"Oh, that alters the case," said George. "But stay!" and he knitted his brows, and reflected.
Up to a moment ago, the loftiness of Catharine Peyton's demeanor, and the celestial something in her soul-like, dreamy eyes, had convinced him she was a creature free from the small dishonesty and lubricity he had noted in so many women otherwise amiable and good. But this business of the letter had shaken the illusion.
"Stay!" said he, stiffly, "You say Mr. Gaunt and you are out?"
Catharine assented by a movement of her fair head.
"And he is leaving the country. Perhaps this letter is to keep him from leaving the country."