"Oh, no doubt, through thick and thin," was the rather sneering reply, "unkind indeed, I should say, it was cruel kindness 'that the wrong from right defends;' as for Mary, I am glad to find that she has for some time not been quite the blindly obstinate and deluded person I had began regretfully to esteem her, that her infatuation has long since been giving way before the evidences of truth and reason--yes, her charity in the point in question is rather more honourable to her character than that which you profess; there being an old proverb I have somewhere read, which says: 'Charity is an angel when it rejoices in the truth; but (something with a very different name) when it embraces that, which it should only pity and weep over.'" Tears, indeed; the tears of many mingled and conflicting feelings were trickling through the pale fingers clasped over Mary's aching eyes when left alone by her cousin. The letter that morning received from Mr. Wynne, the superscription of which had been noted down by Mr. de Burgh, held tight in her other hand; that letter, which indeed contained such fearful testimony to the truth of Jane Marryott's story, and all she had heard assigned against him, whom she had once so blindly and ignorantly worshipped. Mr. Wynne related succinctly the whole story of Eustace Trevor's wrongs, as confided by his own lips on his first arrival in Wales. This Mr. Wynne had taken on himself to do unauthorized by his friend; it was all, indeed, which Mary's letter seemed purposed to effect--her own communication of having entirely broken off her engagement with Eugene Trevor, only rendering more wholly out of the question the execution of the step she had so urged upon Eugene's brother. For her own sake, for her preservation from a fate he so deprecated on her account--he had promised to sacrifice his own interest--to take no step likely to lead to the well-merited discomfiture and disturbance of his brother, or an exposure of the past. The point on which the agreement turned had now been established. He would not too closely inquire by what means, and in what manner; but the promise he must still consider binding on his part, a promise but too much in unison with the solemn determination of his aggrieved and wounded spirit when last he quitted his father's house, never again to seek a son or brother's place within those dishonoured walls. This had been the substance of Mr. Wynne's letter. How changed the aspect of affairs since the period when it had been penned. How mighty the hand, and by what terrible means had been effected, that which her weak influence had attempted to achieve! It might, indeed, be called an instance in which the still small voice must fail, but the power of the all mighty one be heard in the fire.