“And he took it like an angel, my dear,” Mrs. Meredith said to Aimée a few hours later. “I never have credited Tom with any angelic qualities before, but I see now that it was because I did not do him justice. No one could have been kinder. He seemed really touched that I confided in him at last, only, he said, it was a mistake not to have told the truth at the time; and he was very severe about the false position in which you were placed. But I cried--Heavens, how I cried!--so he could not scold very much; and then he said he appreciated my telling the truth because it was entirely a voluntary act, since he was sure I did him the justice to believe he would never have listened to Percy Joscelyn. I _did_ believe it, and that was the reason I was forced to speak. When he trusted me so, I was ashamed to feel how I had deceived him!” “I have often wondered,” said Aimée, “that you did not feel it before.” “No doubt I ought to have done so,” replied Fanny, penitently, “and perhaps I suffered more than you would believe; for I feel now as light--oh, as light as a feather, to think that there is no more need for concealment. Lennox will be glad. He was always so desperately indignant about you. I really believe that he fell in love with you at that time.” Aimée smiled a little. Probably Lennox had already told her so. “And what a pleasant thing it is,” Mrs. Meredith went on, “to reflect that this is the only result of Percy’s attempt to make mischief--the viper! Aimée, do you know that there are dreadful possibilities of malice in that man? I shudder when I remember the expression of his face as he stood there”--she pointed to the spot--“looking at me. And what makes me shudder, is the thought of his having any power over you.” “He has none at all,” said Aimée, a little haughtily. “What is Percy Joscelyn to me?” “To _you_?--nothing. But he directs every act of your mother and stepfather, and therefore he has a dangerous power over your life. I tell you frankly that I shall never feel that you are safe until you are married and out of their clutches.” “Safe from what?” asked Aimée, quietly. “Well,” answered Fanny, reluctantly, “I don’t want to be melodramatic, or I should say safe from danger. I believe Percy to be capable of any wickedness. I did not think so until to-day. Hitherto I have thought him more mean than wicked, but it was as if I looked down into his soul when he stood there gazing at me with hatred in his eyes, and what I saw there was as black as--as the bottomless pit!” “Fanny!” said Aimée, astonished and startled, for this flight of imagination was singularly unlike Fanny, who generally took things on the surface, and was not at all addicted to descending in fancy to the region of which she spoke. “I mean exactly what I say, my dear,” replied her cousin, with energy. “I assure you that I wish I could see you married to-morrow.”