Suddenly, as he read the lines touching himself, "Brilliant and able and unscrupulous....

and though he loves me little, as he loves you little too," his eye lighted up with anger, his face became pale--yet he had borne the same truths from Faith without resentment, in the wood by the mill that other year.
For a moment he stood infuriated, then, going to the fireplace, he dropped the letter on the coals, as Hylda, in horror, started forward to arrest his hand.
"Oh, Eglington--but no--no! It is not honourable.

It is proof of all!" He turned upon her slowly, his face rigid, a strange, cold light in his eyes.

"If there is no more proof than that, you need not vex your mind," he said, commanding his voice to evenness.
A bitter anger was on him.

His mother had read him through and through--he had not deceived her even; and she had given evidence against him to Hylda, who, he had ever thought, believed in him completely.