"Will these suffice?" said Vargrave, as he drew forth the letters of Winsley and Lady Vargrave. Maltravers took them, but it was some moments before he could dare to read. He supported himself with difficulty from falling to the ground; there was a gurgle in his throat like the sound of the death-rattle; at last he read, and dropped the letters from his hand. "Wait me here," he said very faintly, and moved mechanically to the door. "Hold!" said Lord Vargrave, laying his hand upon Ernest's arm. "Listen to me for Evelyn's sake, for her mother's. You are about to seek Evelyn,--be it so! I know that you possess the god-like gift of self-control. You will not suffer her to learn that her mother has done that which dishonours alike mother and child? You will not consummate your wrong to Alice Darvil by robbing her of the fruit of a life of penitence and remorse? You will not unveil her shame to her own daughter? Convince yourself, and master yourself while you do so!" "Fear me not," said Maltravers, with a terrible smile; "I will not afflict my conscience with a double curse. As I have sowed, so must I reap. Wait me here!" CHAPTER III. . . . MISERY That gathers force each moment as it rolls, And must, at last, o'erwhelm me.--LILLO: _Fatal Curiosity_. MALTRAVERS found Evelyn alone; she turned towards him with her usual sweet smile of welcome; but the smile vanished at once, as her eyes met his changed and working countenance; cold drops stood upon the rigid and marble brow, the lips writhed as if in bodily torture, the muscles of the face had fallen, and there was a wildness which appalled her in the fixed and feverish brightness of the eyes. "You are ill, Ernest,--dear Ernest, you are ill,--your look freezes me!" "Nay, Evelyn," said Maltravers, recovering himself by one of those efforts of which men who have _suffered without sympathy_ are alone capable,--"nay, I am better now; I have been ill--very ill--but I am better!" "Ill! and I not know of it?" She attempted to take his hand as she spoke. Maltravers recoiled. "It is fire! it burns! Avaunt!" he cried, frantically. "O Heaven! spare me, spare me!" Evelyn was not seriously alarmed; she gazed on him with the tenderest compassion. Was this one of those moody and overwhelming paroxysms to which it had been whispered abroad that he was subject? Strange as it may seem, despite her terror, he was dearer to her in that hour--as she believed, of gloom and darkness--than in all the glory of his majestic intellect, or all the blandishments of his soft address. "What has happened to you?" she said, approaching him again; "have you seen Lord Vargrave? I know that he has arrived, for his servant has been here to say so; has he uttered anything to distress you? or has--" (she added falteringly and timidly)--"has poor Evelyn offended you? Speak to me,--only speak!"