Hannah took the letter to Helen, who was in the last stage of dressing, just putting the finishing touches to her hair. Staring at the state her letter was in, she read the few words I had written, and then went into a passion at what Lee had done. Helen Whitney was as good-hearted a girl as ever lived, but hot and hasty in temper, saying anything that came uppermost when put out. She, by the help of time, had got over the smart left by the summary collapse of her marriage, and had ceased to abuse Mr. Richard Foliott. All that was now a thing of the past. And, not having had a spark of love for him, he was the more easily forgotten. "The wicked old sinner!" she burst out: and with emphasis so startling, that Anna, reading by the window, dropped her Prayer-book. "Helen! What is the matter?" "_That's_ the matter," flashed Helen, showing the half-burnt envelope and scorched letter, and flinging on the table the piece of paper I had slipped inside. Anna took the letter up and read it. "Poor old man! It was only an accident, Helen; and, I suppose, as Johnny says, no real damage is done. You must not say anything about it." "Must I not!" was Helen's tart retort. "Who is the letter from?" "Never you mind." "But is it from home?" "It is from Mr. Leafchild, if you must know." "Oh," said Anna shortly. For that a flirtation, or something of the kind, had been going on between Helen and the curate, Leafchild, and that it would not be likely to find favour at Whitney Hall, she was quite aware of. "Mr. Leafchild writes about the school," added Helen, after reading the letter; perhaps tendering the information as an apology for its having come at all. "Those two impudent girls, Kate and Judith Dill, have been setting Miss Barn at defiance, and creating no end of insubordination." With the last word, she was leaving the room; the letter in her pocket, the burnt envelope in her hand. Anna stopped her. "You are not going to show that, are you, Helen? Please don't." "Mr. Todhetley ought to see it--and call Lee to account for his carelessness. Why, he might have altogether burnt the letter!" "Yes; of course it was careless. But I dare say it will be a lesson to him. He is very poor and old, Helen. Pray don't tell the Squire; he might make so much commotion over it, and then you would be sorry. Johnny asks you not." Helen knitted her brow, but put the envelope into her pocket with the letter: not conceding with at all a good grace, and went down nodding her head in semi-defiance. The cream of the sting lay no doubt in the fact that the letter was Mr. Leafchild's, and that other eyes than her own might have seen it. She did not say anything at the breakfast-table, though Anna sat upon thorns lest she should: Helen was so apt to speak upon impulse. The Squire talked of riding out; Whitney said he would go with him: Tod seemed undecided what he should do. Mrs. Todhetley read to them the contents of her letter--which was from Mary Blair.