"Yes, George; it is true. I did show your letter to Mr. Harcourt." So stern had he been in his bearing that she could not condescend even to a word of apology. He had hitherto remained standing; but on hearing this he flung himself into a chair and buried his face in his hands. Even then she might have been softened, and he might have relented, and all might have been well! "I was very unhappy, George," she said; "that letter had made me very unhappy, and I hardly knew where to turn for relief." "What!" he said, jumping up and flashing before her in a storm of passion to which his former sternness had been as nothing--"what! my letter made you so unhappy that you were obliged to go to Mr. Harcourt for relief! You appealed for sympathy from me to him! from me who am--no, who was, your affianced husband! Had you no idea of the sort of bond that existed between you and me? Did you not know that there were matters in which you could not look for sympathy to such as him without being false, nay, almost worse than false? Have you ever thought what it is to be the one loved object of a man's heart, and to have accepted that love?" She had been on the point of interrupting him, but the softness of these last words interrupted her for a moment. "Such a letter as that! Do you remember that letter, Caroline?" "Yes, I remember it; remember it too well; I would not keep it. I would not feel that such words from you were ever by me." "You mean that it was harsh?" "It was cruel." "Harsh or cruel, or what you will--I shall not now stop to defend it--it was one which from the very nature of it should have been sacred between us. It was written to you as to one to whom I had a right to write as my future wife." "No one could have a right to write such a letter as that." "In it, I particularly begged that Mr. Harcourt might not be made an arbiter between us. I made a special request that to him, at least, you would not talk of what causes of trouble there might be between us; and yet you selected him as your confidant, read it with him, poured over with him the words which had come hot from my heart, discussed with him my love--my--my--my-- Bah! I cannot endure it; had not you yourself told me so, I could not have believed it." "George!--" "Good God! that you should take my letters and read them over with him! Why, Caroline, it admits but of one solution; there is but one reading to the riddle; ask all the world." "We sent for him as your friend." "Yes, and seem to have soon used him as your own. I have no friend to whom I allow the privilege of going between me and my own heart's love. Yes, you were my own heart's love. I have to get over that complaint now as best I may." "I may consider then that all is over between us." "Yes; there. You have back your hand. It is again your own to dispose of to whom you will. Let you have what confidences you will, they will no longer imply falsehood to me."