"I don't know--I don't know! I think I--I hate him; but I cannot be
sure."
"It's his fault then? He's done something bad?"
"Very bad!" cried poor Cynthia, hiding her face.
"And you can't forgive him?"
"Not--not till he has made amends!" said the girl, with a passionate
sob.
Her father sat looking at her with a troubled face.
"If your mother hadn't forgiven me many and many a time, Cynthia," he
said at last, "I should have gone to destruction long before she died.
But as long as ever she lived she kept me straight."
"She was your wife," said Cynthia, in a choked voice. "I am not Hubert's
wife--and I never shall be now. Never mind, father; we were right to
separate, and I am glad that we have done it. Now will you tell me where
you are thinking of going, or if you have made any plans?"
Westwood shook his head.
"I've got no plans, my dear--except to slip out at the door, early
to-morrow morning. Where I go next I am sure I do not know."
Cynthia resolutely banished the thought of her own affairs, and set
herself to consider possibilities. Her mind reverted again and again to
the Jenkins family. Their connection with Hubert made it seem a little
dangerous to have anything to do with them at present; and yet Cynthia
was inclined to trust Tom Jenkins very far. He was thoroughly honest and
true, and he was devoted to her service; but, after some reflection, she
abandoned this idea. If she and her father were to be together, she had
better seek some place where her own face was unknown and her father's
history forgotten. After a little consideration, she remembered some
people whom she had heard of in the days of her engagement at the
Frivolity. They let lodgings in an obscure street in Clerkenwell; and,
as they were quiet inoffensive folk, Cynthia thought that she and her
father might be as safe with them as elsewhere. She did not urge her
father to leave England at present; for she had a vague feeling that she
ought not to cut him off from the chance--a feeble chance, but still a
chance--of being cleared by Hubert Lepel's confession. She had not much
hope; and yet it seemed to her possible that Hubert might choose to tell
the truth at last, and that she could but hope that, having confessed to
her, he might also confess to the world at large, and show that Westwood
was an innocent and deeply injured man.
She stayed the night, sleeping on a little sofa in the sitting-room; but
early the next day they went out together, making one of the early
morning "flittings" to which Westwood was accustomed; and Cynthia took
her father to his new lodgings in Clerkenwell.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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