The result of this was, on Percy's part, another frantic appeal to
Lena to find some means of helping him before Easter, that Seabrooke
was very hard on him and determined not to spare him.
This letter would never have reached Lena had it not been delivered
into the hands of Colonel Rush, who met the postman at the foot of
his own steps, and took this with others from him. For Hannah,
following out her policy that the end justified the means, and
undeterred by the scrape into which Percy had brought himself by
means somewhat similar, kept on the watch for letters for Lena,
determined to hide and destroy any which should come from Percy.
She fancied that she had not yet made up her mind to the course she
would pursue; but she really had done so, though the faithful old
nurse clung till the last moment to the cherished gold, with a faint
hope that something might yet chance to save it.
The colonel went up to pay a little visit to Lena, and came down
looking rather perturbed and anxious.
"That child continues to look badly," he said to Mrs. Rush, "and she
appears to me to have something on her mind. Do you think it is
possible, now that Russell is better?"
"I am sure of it," answered his wife, "sure that something is
troubling her very much, and I was about to speak of it to you. She
is such a reticent, reserved child, that I did not like to try and
force her confidence, although I have opened the way for her to give
it to me if she chose to do so.
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