Mattie's box was fetched away from Great Suffolk Street; the man who called for it brought a note to Ann Packet, which she found a friend to read for her later in the day. It did not furnish Ann Packet with her address--"When I am settled, Ann," she promised, quoting her own words on that morning of departure, "and I am very unsettled yet awhile." Poor Ann Packet, who had looked forward to paying sundry flying visits to Mattie, and upon spending her holiday once a month with her, mourned over this evasion of Mattie's--"won't she trust even in me, or think of me a bit?" she said. In Mattie's letter was enclosed a smaller one to Harriet Wesden, who understood the _coup d'étât_ which had ensued by that time, and was agitated and unhappy concerning it. This was Mattie's letter to Harriet Wesden, _in extenso_:-- "Keep your promise, dearest Harriet--never forget that your happiness, and that of others, depend upon it. Do not think that I have taken the blame, or am a victim--it is not only for my actions of that night that I have gone away. Sooner or later, it must have come. God bless you!--I hope to see you again soon. Your letter to Sidney is destroyed." Harriet pondered over this missive. For weeks she became more thoughtful, and aroused fresh anxiety in her father--for weeks went on an unknown and fierce struggle to break away from her promise and tell all. She had been afraid of the revelation, and what would be said and thought about it; she had seen her innocence construed as half-consent, and herself set down as an accomplice in Mr. Darcy's plot; she had feared losing the esteem and confidence of all who now respected her. But when Mattie had been sent away for keeping out all night--and though she had not heard the story, she guessed of whom Mattie had been in search--her sense of justice, her love for Mattie, led her more than once to the verge of the revelation. Keeping her own secret was one thing, but the blame to rest on another was very different, and despite her promise--into which she had been entrapped as it were--the avowal was ever trembling on her lips. After, all it was but the truth to confess--her father and mother would believe her; and if Sidney Hinchford turned away, why surely there was nothing to grieve at in that--she could not have loved Sidney, or that letter would never have been written to him! And yet let it be recorded here, Harriet Wesden's main incentive to keep her secret close was for Sidney Hinchford's sake. It tortured her to think that she should have ever entertained one feeling of love or liking for the Mr. Darcy who had sought her humiliation; the shock to her pride had not only turned her utterly away from Mr. Darcy, but the very contrast he presented to young Hinchford, had aroused the old, or given birth to a new affection for the latter.