“Thank you, dear Mrs. Sutton. I should take pleasure in obliging you; but if Mabel is out of sorts, I don't believe she will care to have the house lively to-night,” was the amiable rejoinder. “Moreover, I am dying to finish 'David Copperfield.' Will you allow me to curl myself up in the big chair here, and read for an hour?” Mrs. Sutton gave a consent that was almost glad in its alacrity, and pretended to occupy herself with the newspapers brought by the evening mail, until she judged that Mabel had had season in which to compose her thoughts. Then she muttered something about “breakfast,” “muffins,” and “Daphne,” caught up her key-basket, and bustled out. Rosa's book fell from before her face at the sound of the closing door. The liquid eyes were turbid; her features moved by some passion mightier far than curiosity or compassion for her friend's distress. “I have done nothing--literally nothing, to bring this on!” was the reflection which brought most calm to her agitated mind. “If it should be as I think, I am guiltless of treachery. My skirts are clear. My hands are clean! Yet there have been moments when I could have dipped them in blood that this end might be attained!” Too restless to remain quiet, she tossed her book aside and wandered from side to side of the room, halting frequently to hearken for Mrs. Sutton's return, or some noise from the conference chamber that might alleviate her suspense. “I tried to put her on her guard,” she broke forth at length, bent, it would seem, upon self-justification against an invisible accuser. “I saw aversion in Winston's eye the day he came home to find the other here. He would never forgive his slave the presumption of choosing a husband for herself. Did I not tell her so? Yet this has caught her like a rabbit in a trap--unprepared for endurance or resistance. The spiritless baby! Would I give him up, except with life, if he loved me as he does her?” It was not a baby's face that was confronting Mrs. Sutton's just then. It was no weak, spiritless slave who sustained the pelting shower of her comments, her wonderment and her entreaties that Mabel would refuse to abide by her brother's decision--her guardian though he was--and if she would not write to Frederic with her own hand, empower her aunt to apply to him for an explanation of the disgraceful mystery. “We should condemn no man unheard,” she argued. “It is but fair to give him an opportunity of telling his side of the story.”