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If the vigour of Harley's address had taken by surprise both friend and foe, not one in that assembly -- not even the conscience-stricken Egerton -- felt its effect so deeply as the assailed and startled Leonard. He was at first perfectly stunned by sarcasms which he so ill deserved; nor was it till after the assembly had broken up, that Leonard could even conjecture the cause which had provoked the taunt and barbed its dart. Evidently Harley had learned (but learned only in order to misconceive and to wrong) Leonard's confession of love to Helen Digby. And now those implied accusations of disregard to the duties of common life not only galled the young man's heart, but outraged his honour. He felt the generous indignation of manhood. He must see Lord L'Estrange at once, and vindicate himself, -- vindicate Helen; for thus to accuse one was tacitly to asperse the other.
Extricating himself from his own enthusiastic partisans, Leonard went straight on foot towards Lansmere House. The Park palings touched close upon the town, with a shall turnstile for foot passengers. And as Leonard, availing himself of this entrance, had advanced some hundred yards or so through the park, suddenly, in the midst of that very copse in which Avenel had appointed to meet Leslie, he found himself face to face with Helen Digby herself.