Without waiting for an answer, Sir Gilbert left the party in the garden, and hurried into the house, whence he returned in a few minutes with a scrap of paper in his hand. "Fortunately, Charles, very fortunately, I have kept a copy of my last note to your mother. I am sure I know not what induced me to keep it: had such a thing happened to Mr. Cartwright, he would have declared it providential--but I, in my modesty, only call it lucky.--Take this paper, Charles, and read it if you will: 'tis a shame you have not read it before! You say, I think, that the vicar is expected at Mowbray this evening: just put this scrap of paper into his hand, and ask him if he ever read it before. Let him say what he will, I give you credit for sufficient sharpness to find out the truth. If he has seen it, I shall know whom I have to thank for the insolent contempt it has met with." "But my mother!" cried Charles with emotion. "Is it possible that she could conceal such a note as this from her children, and show it to this man? Sir Gilbert, I cannot believe it." "I don't like to believe it myself, Charles; upon my life I don't. But what can we think? At any rate, make the experiment to-night; it can do no harm; and come here to dinner to-morrow to tell us the result." "I will come to you with the greatest pleasure, and bring you all the intelligence I can get. My own opinion is, that the note was lost before it reached my mother's hands. The usual hour, I suppose, Sir Gilbert,--six o'clock?" "Six o'clock, Charles,--and, as usual, punctual to a moment." When Mowbray reached his home, it was, in truth, rather more than time to dress; but he kept the young ladies waiting as short a time as possible. Fanny presented him in proper style to Miss Cartwright as soon as he appeared in the drawing-room; and he had the honour of giving that silent young lady his arm to the dining-room. Charles thought her deep-set black eyes very handsome; nevertheless, he secretly wished that she were a hundred miles off, for her presence, of course, checked every approach to confidential conversation. Nothing, indeed, could well be more dull and unprofitable than this dinner. Miss Cartwright spoke not at all; Fanny, no more than was necessary for the performance of her duty at the head of the table; and Rosalind looked pale and languid, and so completely out of spirits, that every word she spoke seemed a painful effort to her. She was occupied in recalling to mind the tone and air of the party who dined together in that same room about six months before, when Charles had last returned from Oxford. The contrast these recollections offered to the aspect of the present party was most painful; and as Rosalind turned her eyes round the table with a look of wistful melancholy, as if looking for those who were no longer there, her thoughts were so legibly written on her countenance, that Mowbray understood them as plainly as if they had been spoken.