P.S. I have reason to believe that Clifton is more seriously offended than I ever knew him before. When I refused going to the play with him, he persisted in saying I might change my mind before night, and that he would come again in that hope. His manner of parting with me, after being told Frank was entrusted with a business which we had not dared confide to him, was, as I have described, unusual, and accompanied with more coldness and reserve than either of us had ever before assumed. It is now eight o'clock, and I have not seen him since. If he have resolution enough to keep away the whole evening, which I suspect he will have, the proof of the truth of my conjectures will be indubitable. I know not, when he comes to hear the business, whether he will be convinced that he was less proper to transact it than Frank; otherwise I should not be sorry, could he but certainly feel himself wrong: for it is by a repetition of such lessons that the good we intend must be effected. Be it as it will, let us neither recede nor slacken our endeavours. I suspect that every worthy task must be a task of difficulty, and often of danger. LETTER LXX _Anna Wenbourne St. Ives to Louisa Clifton_ _London, Grosvenor Street_ Frank is returned; and, as usual, crowned with success. I had been puzzling myself to no purpose, concerning Mr. Mac Fane being one of our old acquaintance. It appears he was the accomplice of the highwayman, Webb, the brother of Peggy, who was shot by Frank at Turnham Green. He forebore to tell me, in part because he had not time to connect and relate the grounds of his suspicion; though his chief reason was lest a whisper, heard by Laura or any other, should have betrayed and overturned his whole scheme. He went immediately to question Mrs. Clarke, concerning her nephew. She knew not what was become of him; for, after having determined to go abroad, he changed his mind; and, being reproved and discountenanced by her, he had forborne his visits. She had even refused to hear his name mentioned. But she believed her niece, Peggy, had some knowledge of him; though she was not certain. Frank thought proper to confide in Mrs. Clarke, and they immediately went in quest of the niece. From her they learned that he had been promoted to the office of groom-porter at a gambling house: and in fact he proved to be the very man who had been present at the transaction between Edward and Mr. Mac Fane. Peggy was next questioned concerning his present hiding-place. She was confused; she stammered, and trembled. Was not her brother in danger? Could she be sure no harm would come to him?--At last however the mild and humane reasoning of Frank, and the authority of Mrs. Clarke subdued, her terrors--He was in the house.