your carriage sent down; but we shall be moving soon to Teviot House. Will you take your maid, and go out? You see I have plenty of amusement," pointing to the heaps of letters that were lying by him.
"Well, I think I will go for half an hour, as you do not want me," said Helen, who dreaded the effect that the first announcement of Mr. Lorimer's pretensions might have on Lord Teviot in his present weak state; and conjectured that he would dislike having any witness of his first emotions. "I shall not be long away."
When she returned, she found him still lying on his sofa, looking exhausted, and with two red, feverish spots on his cheeks. A quantity of opened letters were strewed on the carpet beside him; others, unopened, were still on the table. She knelt down, and, taking his thin hand in hers, said, "You have been overtiring yourself with those tiresome letters."
"Perhaps so," he said, dejectedly.
"Do not open any more; let me look over the others for you."
"No, no," he said hastily. "You should not see them; they are full of vexation."
"That is all the more reason why I should, dear Teviot. Do not keep any vexations to yourself; we should bear them better together."
"It was for your sake I did not want you to know what I have heard. My poor Helen, what will you feel, when you know that, in marrying me, you may have married an unconscious impostor? that name, and fortune, and all"
"You mean," she said, looking up at him with a smile, and kissing the hand she held, "that Harry Lorimer is trying to take it all from us. He means to be Lord Teviot himself. Happily he cannot be my Teviot, whatever happens; and who knows if he will not fail in all the rest!"
"Helen!" said Lord Teviot, starting up, "is it possible
