"My poor Hyacinth!" he said. "Oh, if she had but trusted me--if she had but trusted me--if she had but told me herself of this error, and not left me to hear it from others! I can forgive that half-elopement; it was but the shadow of a sin, after all, repented of before it was half committed, and atoned for by bitter suffering. But I find it hard to forgive her for not having trusted me." Then, again he remembered how young, how shy, how timid she was. "I must not be hard on her, even in my thoughts," he said; "perhaps she intended to tell me when she was more at her ease with me." Then, as the simple story of her heroism told upon him, he ceased to think of her fault, and was lost in admiration of her courage. "How many there are," he thought, "who would have let the prisoner take his chance, and would have thought more of saving their reputation than of preserving his life! How simple and brave, how true and loyal she is! Oh, Cynthy, my lost love, if you had but trusted me!" He took up the _Times_, and there he found the story told again. All notice of her fault was quite hidden by the admiration expressed for her courage, her unselfish heroism, her undaunted bravery. "If I could but find her," he said--"find her and tell her the world admires instead of condemning her!" He understood better than anyone her sensitive disposition; he knew that she would deem herself all unworthy--that she would look upon herself as lost to home, to friends, to hope, to happiness, to love; he knew how her tender conscience magnified even trifling faults, and his heart grew heavy for her. Where was she? What was she doing? What would become of her? He redoubled his efforts, but they were all in vain. After days and weeks fruitlessly spent, he returned to Bergheim, having no good news to tell. By the stately baronet and his wife Adrian's story was heard without one comment. Lady Vaughan's fair old face grew cold and sad. "Did she--the child I trusted--deceive me so far as to leave my roof with a stranger? Tell me no more, Adrian; my heart is heavy and sore. This is the first taint that has ever fallen on the Vaughans." "You must not call it a taint," cried Adrian. "Do not forget how young she was, how full of poetry and romance, how easily persuaded--a girl like Hyacinth would be but as a reed in the hands of Claude Lennox." "The Vaughans are never weak, Adrian; they have ever been a brave and noble race." "Not one of them has been braver or more noble than Hyacinth," cried Adrian, hotly. "I do not say that she is without fault, or that she is not to blame; but I do say the atonement made far exceeds the fault; think of the courage required of a young girl like her to stand up in a public court and tell the story of an error like hers, even though it was so quickly repented of." "Think of the shame," said Lady Vaughan, with a shudder. But Adrian would not have it so. He told Lady Vaughan what the newspapers said of her granddaughter.