There was a light of interest in Lesley's eyes. She did not altogether understand her mother's tone. It sounded as though Lady Alice condemned lovers and all their ways, and such condemnation puzzled the girl, in spite of her convent breeding. During the last few months she had been allowed a much wider range of literature than was usual in the Sisters' domain; her mother had requested that she should be supplied with certain volumes of history, fiction, and poetry, that had considerably enlarged Lesley's views of life; and yet Lady Alice's words seemed to contradict all that the girl had previously heard or read of love. The mother read the unspoken question in Lesley's eyes, and answered it in a somewhat modified tone. "My dear, I do not mean that I think it wrong to love. So long as the world lasts I suppose people will love--and be miserable. It is right enough, if it is opposed by no other law. But in my case, I was wrong from beginning to end. I knew that my father would never give his permission to my marriage with Mr. Brooke; and, in my youthful folly, I thought that my best plan was to take my own way. I married Mr. Brooke in private, and then I went away with him to London. And it was not long, Lesley, before I rued my disobedience and my deceit. It was a great mistake." "But mamma, why were you so sure that grandpapa would not give his consent?" Lady Alice opened her gentle eyes with a look of profound astonishment. "Darling, don't you see? Mr. Brooke was--nobody." "But if you loved him----" "No, Lesley, your grandfather would never have heard of such a marriage. He had his own plans for me. My dear, I am not saying a word against your father in saying this. I am only telling you the fact--that he was what is often called a self-made, self-educated man, who could not possibly be styled my equal in the eyes of society. His father had been a small tradesman in Devonshire. The son being clever and--and--handsome, made his way a little in the world. He became a journalist: he wrote for magazines and newspapers and reviews: he was what is called a literary hack. He had no certain prospects, no certain income, when he married me. I think," said Lady Alice, with a sort of cold scorn, which was intensified by the very softness of her tones, "that he could not have done a more unjustifiable thing than persuade a girl in my position to marry him." Lesley felt a slight diminution of sympathy with her mother. Perhaps Lady Alice was conscious of some change in her face, for she added hastily.