Intense pity for the girl mingled with his passion for her, and added to his great perplexity; and thus, while his cheek alternately flushed and grew pale, he sat with half-averted face, and the fingers of one hand buried among his thick brown hair, irritated by the conviction that his father's cold, keen, and scrutinising eyes were bent loweringly upon him, while in silence he heard the General bluntly urging him "if he had any tender views in that quarter, to get rid of them as soon as possible, and be off to join his regiment;" for to Trecarrel military service seemed a cure for every human ill. "But the letter she showed you?" pled Audley. "That letter, sir, I have already denounced as a most daring forgery!" replied Downie, with as much energy as his usually quiet manner permitted. "Could she--one so eminently like a lady--be guilty of such a crime?" "Your uncle's mistress would be, of course, familiar with his handwriting." Audley felt his heart vibrate painfully at this injurious but, as the circumstances seemed to stand, not inapplicable term. Compassion and tenderness pleaded for the dove-eyed Sybil; but policy, society, or the promptings of "Mrs. Grundy" urged that he should, nay must, relinquish all thought of her for ever; so while sitting there, sipping his golden-tinted château yquem, and playing with the embossed grape scissors, to all appearance very calm and quiet, a storm of doubt and shame was struggling in his heart with love; "for this passion," says Lord Bacon, "hath its floods in the very times of weakness, which are great prosperity and great adversity, both which times kindle love and make it more fervent." And now Sybil was in an adversity of which he knew not the actual depth. "To me it seems that you are somewhat severe in this whole affair, General," said he, after a pause. "God forgive me if I am so!" replied Trecarrel, earnestly. "Suppose this girl's position to be all you advance, if we love because we like and admire each other, are we to be censured?" "Then who the devil should be censured?" said his father, with asperity. "Destiny." "Pshaw!" said Downie; "this is mere romance--mooning!" "And deuced unlike one of the 14th Hussars," added Trecarrel. "The very rubbish of which dramas are made." "You are right, Downie; but, till now, I always thought this young fellow of yours was rather fond of my girl Rose." Audley coloured deeply, and assisted himself to wine, as he said-- "I greatly admire both Miss Trecarrel and her sister Miss Rose; but I have not the honour to stand higher in their favour than that of others." "But this girl Devereaux----" his father was beginning passionately.