"
Paul made no doubt that it was the same transfer that had
shipwrecked the colonel's fortune and alienated his friends, and
could not help replying somewhat pointedly, "But I think it should,
Miss Yerba. I don't know what the colonel explained to you--
doubtless, not the whole truth, for he is not a man to praise
himself; but, the fact is, the bank was in difficulties at the time
of that transfer, and, to make it, he sacrificed his personal
fortune, and, I think, awakened some of that ill-feeling you have
just noticed." He checked himself too late: he had again lost not
only his tact and self-control, but had nearly betrayed himself.
He was surprised that the girl's justifiable ignorance should have
irritated him. Yet she had evidently not noticed, or misunderstood
it, for she said, with a certain precision that was almost
studied:--
"Yes, I suppose it would have been a terrible thing to him to have
been suspected of misappropriating a Trust confided to him by
parties who had already paid him the high compliment of confiding
to his care a secret and a fortune."
Paul glanced at her quickly with astonishment. Was this ignorance,
or suspicion? Her manner, however, suddenly changed, with the
charming capriciousness of youth and conscious beauty.
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