“A runaway wife! Hyacinth! Great God!” She clasped her hands before her face in an agony of shame and despair, falling upon her knees in sudden self-abasement, her head drooping until her brow almost touched the ground. And then, after but a few minutes of this deep humiliation, she started to her feet with a cry of anger. “Liar! villain! despicable, devilish villain! This is a lie, like the other—a wicked lie! Your wife—your wife a wanton? My sister? My life upon it, she is in London—in your house, busy preparing for my marriage. Unlock that door, my lord; let me go this instant—back to my father. Oh, that I could be so mad as to leave his protection at your bidding! Open the door, sir, I command you!” She seemed to gain in height, and to be taller than he had thought her—he who had so watched her, and whose memory held every line of that slender, graceful figure. She stood straight as an arrow, looking at him with set lips and flaming eyes, too angry to be afraid, trembling, but with indignation, not fear of him. “Nay, child,” he said gravely, “I have got you, and I mean to keep you. But you have trusted yourself to my hospitality, and you are safe in my house as in a sanctuary. I may be a villain, but I am not a ruffian. If I have brought you here by a trick, you are as much mistress of your life and fate under this roof as you ever were in your father’s house.” “I have but one thing to say, sir. Let me out of this hateful house.” “What then? Would you walk back to the Manor Moat, through the night—alone?” “I would crawl there on my hands and knees if I could not walk; anything to get away from you. Oh, the baseness of it! To vilify my sister—for your own base purposes. Intolerable villain!” “Mistress, we will soon put an end to that charge. Lies there have been, but that is none. ’Tis you are the slanderer there.” He took a letter from the pocket of his doublet, and handed it to her. Then he took the lamp from the mantelshelf and held it while she read. Alas, it was her sister’s hand. She knew those hurried characters too well. The letter was blotted with ink and smeared as with tears. Angela’s tears began to rain upon the page as she read:— “I have tried to be a good woman and a true wife to you, tried hard for these many years, knowing all the time that you had left off loving me, and but for the shame of it would have cared little, though I had as many lovers as a maid of honour. You made life harder for me in this year last past by your passion for my sister, which mystery of yours, silent and secret as you were, these eyes must have been blind not to discover. “And while you were cold in manner and cruel of speech—slighting me ever—there was one who loved and praised me, one whose value I knew not till he left this country, and I found myself desolate without him.