One would have thought that Jim had been in some measure prepared for the just-fallen blow, both by the overheard fragments of Mr. Greenock's conversation with the Devonshire clergyman at Florence last year; by the accumulated evidence of there being some blight upon Elizabeth's life; and, lastly and chiefly, by the ravings of Byng. But there is something so different from all these, so infinitely more dreadful, in hearing this naked statement from her own lips, that it stuns him as much as if he had never received any hint of that ruinous secret in the background of her life. Having now uttered it, she stops, either to pick up her own spent strength or to give him the opportunity for some question or comment. He makes neither. "I thought--I hoped--that you had guessed, from what Mr. Byng said. I believed that when he was not himself----" Again she breaks off, but still no sound comes from Jim. "You understand, of course, that that was what I told him. I wanted to tell him the rest, but that time he could not hear it, and the last time he--he--did not care to hear it." His continued muteness must daunt her, for she here makes a longer pause than before. Indeed, it is only the fear lest she should mean it for a final one that enables him to force out the two husky monosyllables: "Go on." She is always most obedient, and she now obeys. "He came only two days after you left us; that was why the sight of you was so--so painful to us at first. It was not your fault, but we could not help mixing you up with him. You remember how we tried to avoid you--how discourteous we were? You forgave us afterwards, but you must have observed it." The listener makes a slight motion of assent. "He was a Hungarian, and had been recommended to father by Sir ----, who, as you know, is always so extraordinarily kind to struggling artists, and who thought highly of his talent, and wished to get him commissions. He was almost starving in London; that was one great reason, I think, why father employed him." Even at this moment the thought darts across Jim's mind that he has never known Elizabeth miss an opportunity of implying some praise of that father whose harshness towards herself he has so often had an opportunity of witnessing. "He was quite young--not more than twenty-three--and he looked very ill when he first came; indeed, he was really half starved. It has always been the surest passport to mammy's heart to be poor and sick and down in the world, and nothing could have been kinder than they both were to him." "And well he repaid their kindness," says Jim, indignation at last giving him words. She puts out her hand, as if to stop him. "Wait, wait!" she says, almost authoritatively; "do not abuse him. He seemed very grateful to them, and they all--we all--became quite fond of him. When he grew stronger, he turned out to be very lively and light-hearted--almost as light-hearted as we."