"Oh, Mr. Hunter!" she cried, running eagerly towards him, "I am very glad to see you, and I am glad we are alone. We are all going mad here at the Folly, and it is right you should know it. You have--I am ashamed to say it, for I know you have not deserved her dislike--made an enemy of my cousin Harriet; the strangest suspicions have entered her head; and she may offend you, unless you are put on your guard. You must forgive her: by and by, you will laugh at her folly, and so will she; but at present she seems half-distracted by the events of the day, the disasters of her father, and her fears for the future. Did you not meet her? Alas, she will be here in a moment!" "Fear not," said the young man, in hurried and altered tones, but with an effort to be jocose; "she is down by the park-gate, studying the stars, and reading my own foolish history among them. Miss Catherine,--Miss Loring,--I am aware of your friend's dislike. I am not surprised--she will tolerate your having no friend less interested than herself." "You must not speak thus, Mr. Hunter," cried Catherine, but in too much hurry of spirits to rebuke. "I did wrong to show you her letter: _that_, I fear, is the chief cause of her anger; and your being a stranger, and so great a favourite with my father--oh, and a thousand reasons more she has found, or fancied, for supposing you are--that is, that you have deceived us, and that"---- "That I am--an impostor," said Hyland, hesitating an instant at the word, but pronouncing it at last firmly. "Such is indeed her strange aberration," cried Catherine, apparently overjoyed that the idea so repugnant to herself, had been conceived by the suspected person, and without distress or anger; "and,--and--but this is the maddest and most insulting suspicion of all, (yet you must not be offended:)--she thinks, you--really, I could laugh, but that she has frightened me half out of my wits--she thinks, you are even a tory in disguise!--a refugee,--(ah, now I have said it!)--a comrade of these wild and lawless men, come to spy upon us, and murder us--(is it not too ludicrous?)--a spy, an enemy, a traitor--nay, even a Gilbert--a Hawk of the Hollow! I _can_ laugh, now that I have said it. And now, too, I am sure you will not be offended, the suspicion is so very ridiculous: yes, I am sure you will forgive her." "I do," said the young man, sadly and falteringly, "for her suspicion is just,--at least, it is just in part--I _am_ an impostor." "Heavens!" cried Catherine, "what do you tell me?"