Read "The Octoroon" by Mary Elizabeth Braddon online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Neither Cora nor Toby was aware that there had been a listener during the latter part of their conversation; but it was not less a fact. Gerald Leslie had returned unobserved by either of the excited speakers, and, arrested by the passionate gestures of the mulatto slave, had lingered in the background, anxious to discover the cause of his agitation.
His anger was terrible when he found that the fatal secret, which it had been the business of his life to conceal from Cora, was now revealed. But he still lingered, anxious to hear all.