eyes, so dark and dilated were the shadowy pupils. But it was the expression of misery in her countenance, that riveted the attention; rarely before had so much anguish and beauty been combined in the same face. Some instinct told Walter that she was suffering, and he was come to add to it; still, the sooner what he had to say was said, the better, and he was the first to break silence.
"Lady Marchmont," said he, "will pardon an intrusion dictated by anxiety on her account. Will she permit me to place these letters in her own keeping?"
Henrietta looked at them with a bewildered air; she knew them, at once, for they were only kept together by a riband. A terrible fear rushed across her mind; was Sir George ill?—was he engaged in a duel? The idea of some danger to him was the on]y one that presented itself.
"Did he—did Sir George Kingston," asked she, faintly, "send no message, when he sent these letters?"
