I took the letter from my
pocket.
"I received this this morning, but, believing it to be a jest played
upon me, I have not mentioned it. I have called to ask you if you know
anything of it."
He took the letter from me with a strange smile.
"I wrote it myself last evening," he said, and I looked at him
bewildered.
Good heaven! it was all true. To this moment I do not know how I bore
the shock. I remember falling into a chair, Mr. Moreland standing over
me with a glass of something in his hand, which he forced me to drink.
"Your fortune has a strange effect upon you," he said, kindly.
"I cannot believe it!" I cried, clasping his hand. "I cannot realize it!
I have been working so hard--so hard for one single sovereign--and now,
you say, I am rich!"
"Now, most certainly," he replied, "you are Sir Edgar Trevelyan, master
of Crown Anstey and a rent roll of ten thousand a year."
I am not ashamed to confess that when I heard that I bowed my head on my
hands and cried like a child.
"You have borne bad fortune better than this," said Mr. Moreland; and
then I remember telling him, in incoherent words, how poor we had been
and how Clare was fading away for want of the nourishment and good
support I was utterly unable to find for her.
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