The major evidently suspected
something, Annon was jealous, and my lady would be glad of a pretext to
remove her daughter from his reach. Trusting to his skill in reading
faces, he waited impatiently for morning, resolving to say nothing to
anyone but Mrs. Snowdon, and from her merely to inquire what the note
contained.
Treherne usually was invisible till lunch, often till dinner; therefore,
fearing to excite suspicion by unwonted activity, he did not appear till
noon. The mailbag had just been opened, and everyone was busy over their
letters, but all looked up to exchange a word with the newcomer, and
Octavia impulsively turned to meet him, then checked herself and hid her
suddenly crimsoned face behind a newspaper. Treherne's eye took in
everything, and saw at once in the unusually late arrival of the mail a
pretext for discovering the pilferer of the note.
"All have letters but me, yet I expected one last night. Major, have you
got it among yours?" And as he spoke, Treherne fixed his penetrating
eyes full on the person he addressed.
With no sign of consciousness, no trace of confusion, the major
carefully turned over his pile, and replied in the most natural manner,
"Not a trace of it; I wish there was, for nothing annoys me more than
any delay or mistake about my letters.
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