“You have read it, you shameless woman! Why don’t you lie, like the rest of your tribe, and keep me from dying with indignation? Impudent prying! My maid never posted it, and you have found it and read it! Pray, did you hope to find a secret worth a bribe?” She advanced on Margaret till within a foot of her. “Why don’t you answer, you hussy? I will go this instant to your mistress. You or I leave the house.” Margaret had stood all this time quietly, waiting for an opportunity to speak. Her face was very pale, but perfectly still, and her eyes did not quail. She had not in the least lost her self-possession. She would not say at once that she had read the letter, because that would instantly rouse the tornado again. “You do not know my name, Miss Cameron; of course you could not.” “Your name! What is that to me?” “That,” said Margaret, pointing to the letter, “is my father’s name.” Euphra looked at her own direction again, and then looked at Margaret. She was so bewildered, that if she had any thoughts, she did not know them. Margaret went on: “My father is dead. My mother sent the letter to me.” “Then you have had the impertinence to read it!” “It was my duty to read it.” “Duty! What business had you with it?” Euphra felt ashamed of the letter as soon as she found that she had applied to a man whose daughter was a servant. Margaret answered: “I could at least reply to it so far, that the writer should not think my father had neglected it. I did not know who it was from till I came to the end.” Euphra turned her back on her, with the words: “You may go.” Margaret walked out of the room with an unconscious stately gentleness. “Come back,” cried Euphra. Margaret obeyed. “Of course you will tell all your fellow-servants the contents of this foolish letter.” Margaret’s face flushed, and her eye flashed, at the first words of this speech; but the last words made her forget the first, and to them only she replied. Clasping her hands, she said: “Dear Miss Cameron, do not call it foolish. For God’s sake, do not call it foolish.” “What is it to you? Do you think I am going to make a confidante of you?” Margaret again left the room. Notwithstanding that she had made no answer to her insult, Euphra felt satisfied that her letter was safe from profanation.