"Perhaps as I am so separated
at present from all my own people by this affair with Lord Rufford,
you would not mind seeing the man for me." Of course he promised to
see the lawyer and to do everything that was necessary. "The truth
is, Mr. Green, Mr. Morton was very warmly attached to me. I was a
foolish girl, and could not return it. I thought of it long and was
then obliged to tell him that I could not entertain just that sort
of feeling for him. You cannot think now how bitter is my regret;--
that I should have allowed myself to trust a man so false and
treacherous as Lord Rufford, and that I should have perhaps added a
pang to the deathbed of one so good as Mr. Morton." And so she told
her little story;--not caring very much whether it were believed or
not, but finding it to be absolutely essential that some story
should be told.
During the next day or two Mounser Green thought a great deal about
it. That the story was not exactly true, he knew very well. But it
is not to be expected that a girl before her marriage should be
exactly true about her old loves. That she had been engaged to Lord
Rufford and had been cruelly jilted by him he did believe. That she
had at one time been engaged to the Paragon he was almost sure. The
fact that the Paragon had left her money was a strong argument that
she had not behaved badly to him.
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