I was about to attack both her positions, entirely forgetting those very suspicions which had been confirmed in the course of the evening, but she proceeded with a cold firmness which approached to severity--"What I say is sober and indisputable truth, on which I will neither hear question nor explanation.

We are therefore friends, Mr.
Osbaldistone--are we not ?" She held out her hand, and taking mine, added--"And nothing to each other now, or henceforward, except as friends." She let go my hand.

I sunk it and my head at once, fairly _overcrowed,_ as Spenser would have termed it, by the mingled kindness and firmness of her manner.

She hastened to change the subject.
"Here is a letter," she said, "directed for you, Mr.Osbaldistone, very duly and distinctly; but which, notwithstanding the caution of the person who wrote and addressed it, might perhaps never have reached your hands, had it not fallen into the possession of a certain Pacolet, or enchanted dwarf of mine, whom, like all distressed damsels of romance, I retain in my secret service." I opened the letter and glanced over the contents.

The unfolded sheet of paper dropped from my hands, with the involuntary exclamation of "Gracious Heaven! my folly and disobedience have ruined my father!" Miss Vernon rose with looks of real and affectionate alarm--"You grow pale--you are ill--shall I bring you a glass of water?
Be a man, Mr.
Osbaldistone, and a firm one.