Her indignation at the evident pain it had caused to both mother and son made her utter those cheering words, which, however, she did not wish unsaid. She knew too well how bitterly her husband could write on a subject which irritated him, and she shrunk from the thought of what insults that letter might have contained. But the daughter's feelings on the matter were far more intense and painful, not because Henry Halford had offered and been refused, not from any fear of what her father's letter might have said to cause pain, but from surprise and distress at the concealment. Children whose parents are able to support parental authority have generally the greatest faith in their knowledge, their opinions, and their judgment. "My father says so," "My mamma knows best," are often uttered or thought by young people; and on this account children who live entirely at home grow up narrow-minded, and under the influence of certain opinions which they consider right in contradistinction from all others. Mary Armstrong had very narrowly escaped from such an influence, still her confidence in her father had been unbounded. He had taught her to be open, candid, straightforward, and truthful; and now she had found that while speaking of the schoolmaster as having forgotten the young lady to whom he had been so polite at Oxford, and now and then indulging in a joke about the impossibility of a student being able to love anything but his books, he had known of this young man's love for his daughter, and refused him without one word of reference to herself. She had yet to learn the hardening effects produced by a growing love of money and the acquirement of wealth. They had nearly reached the gate entrance to Lime Grove, when her mother said-- "Mary dear, what passed between you and Mr. Halford, while I was talking to his mother?" "Only a few polite inquiries after my health, and remarks on the weather; indeed, I could scarcely make a commonplace reply, for his white face frightened me; but I understand it all now. Oh, mamma, I cannot tell you how distressed I feel at the discovery we have made, because it lowers my father in my estimation. Oh, if he had only told me!" Mrs. Armstrong sighed as they entered the gate; she had tried for years to believe that her husband was the soul of honour; and though she could account for the concealment of Mr. Halford's letter from his daughter, yet she knew too well that he was not the strictly honourable man in many matters which he wished to appear. Mother and daughter entered the dining-room on that memorable evening totally unprepared for the scene which was about to take place. Mr. Armstrong appeared in the most exuberant spirits; he joked with his daughter, complimented his wife, and during dinner made himself altogether so very agreeable, that Mary's anger against him was fast fading from her heart, in which filial love had so long found a place.