That she would seek to obliterate that image from her heart, as an evil thing, was something he had not for an instant expected.

He did not know how, treasured up in tenderest infancy, through sunny childhood, and in sweetly dawning maidenhood, innocence and truth had formed for her a talisman by which the qualities of others might be tested.

At the first approach of Mr.
Lyon this had given instinctive warning; but his personal attractions were so great, and her father's approving confidence of the man so strong, that the inward monitor was unheeded.

But, after a long silence following a series of impassioned letters, to find herself alluded to in this cold and distant way revealed a state of feeling in the man she loved so wildly, that proved him false beyond all question.

Like one standing on a mountain-top, who suddenly finds the ground giving way beneath his feet, she felt herself sweeping down through a fearfully intervening space, and fell, with scarcely a pulse of life remaining, on the rocky ground beneath.