A Heart's Bitterness — page 232: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

224 A HEART’S BITTERNESS. ‘‘You asked for me, madam,” said the colonel, with a low bow. ‘* Have I the honor % | ‘¢My name is Hope, Miss Hope,” said the visitor, ‘and I haye come to see you on business of the greatest 1m- portance; also of the greatest privacy.” . ‘‘T am at your service,” said the colonel, politely. | ‘It is business that should only be discussed behind closed doors. A word of it, breathed prematurely, would be disastrous. This room is so public, servants near, and possibly other callers admitted. My business may take ‘some time; an hour or two S ‘Surely it can hardly concern me. If it is the presenta- tion of some charity, a prospectus left ig | ‘Tt concerns no charity,” said Miss Hope, with a smile, ‘‘ unless to give you your own is charity. And it does con- cern you, if you are, as I believe, a collateral heir-presump- tive of the Karldom of Leigh.” ‘“<T was,” corrected the colonel, ‘heir presumptive until the birth of the Honorable Rupert Leigh.” ‘In a word,” said Miss Hope, with impatience, ‘* my errand is important, and I trust you will not bar me in performing it. Iam doing my duty. I have made an im- portant discovery, and I come here to discharge my conscience of it. Am I to have full opportunity to speak with you privately?” ‘« Certainly—in my library. But I fancy that this sub- ject is one which equally interests my wife, Lady Clare. Shall she make a third in our interview?” ‘‘Act your pleasure as to that,” said Helen, calmly, as, gathering her lace mantle about her, she moved with the colonel to the library. | Presently Lady Clare entered, cold, haughty, with a su- percilious lifting of her eyebrows, at meeting a person whom she had never seen ‘‘ in society.” Her motions had | astately, swan-like grace, but the low, icy tones of her carefully trained voice filled Helen Hope with a fury of hate; and for some minutes she hesitated whether, for sake of revenge on Leigh, she could put this proud, scornful creature in the place of the sweet, gentle-toned Violet, who, in all provocations, had never given her a cruel look or word. In fact, Colonel Hartington had twice to say to her, ‘* Madam, we hear you,” before Helen could make up her mind to play into the hands of this arrogant pair, who Gomicbooks. co