For a moment Godfrey sat gazing at her, with troubled heart and troubled looks, then between his teeth muttered, "Damn the rascal!" Letty sat straight up, and turned upon him eyes of appeal, scared, yet ready to defend.

Her hands were now clinched, one on each side of her; she was poking the little fists into the squab of the sofa.
"Cousin Godfrey!" she cried, "if you mean Tom, you must not, you must not.

I will go away if you speak a word against him.

I will; I will .-- I _must,_ you know!" Godfrey made no reply--neither apologized nor sought to cover.
"Why, child!" he said at last, "you are half starved!" The pity and tenderness of both word and tone were too much for her.
She had not been at all pitying herself, but such an utterance from the man she loved like an elder brother so wrought upon her enfeebled condition that she broke into a cry.

She strove to suppress her emotion; she fought with it; in her agony she would have rushed from the room, had not Godfrey caught her, drawn her down beside him, and kept her there.