One of the great conditions of anger and hatred is, that you must tell and believe lies against the hated object, in order, as we said, to be consistent.
When the great crash came--the announcement of ruin, and the departure from Russell Square, and the declaration that all was over between her and George--all over between her and love, her and happiness, her and faith in the world--a brutal letter from John Osborne told her in a few curt lines that her father's conduct had been of such a nature that all engagements between the families were at an end--when the final award came, it did not shock her so much as her parents, as her mother rather expected (for John Sedley himself was entirely prostrate in the ruins of his own affairs and shattered honour).

Amelia took the news very palely and calmly.

It was only the confirmation of the dark presages which had long gone before.

It was the mere reading of the sentence--of the crime she had long ago been guilty--the crime of loving wrongly, too violently, against reason.

She told no more of her thoughts now than she had before.