“‘Help’ me?” echoed the weeping woman, with as near an approach to bitterness as her crushed spirit could muster. “_Help_ me? How can anyone help one of Caleb Conover’s slaves? And I am the only one of them all who has no hope of escape. The others can leave him and find work somewhere else. Even the horses he loves to fight have the satisfaction of fighting back. But I haven’t courage enough to do either of those things. What _can_ I do?” It was the first time in their three years of daily intercourse that Anice Lanier had seen or so much as suspected the existence of this feeble spark of resentment in the older woman’s cowed soul. It dumbfounded her, and left her for the time without power of consoling. “Do you know, Miss Lanier,” went on Letty, “at one time I hated you? Yes”—as she noted the pained surprise in the girl’s big, tear-swimming eyes—“actually hated you. You were all I was not. You were not afraid of him. He deferred to you. He never deferred to me, or to anyone else but you since he was born. He never cared for me. And he did care for you. If I were to die——” “Mrs. Conover!” Anice had shaken off Mrs. Conover’s clinging hands, and was on her feet, her eyes dry, her cheeks blazing. “Don’t be angry with me! _Don’t!_” whimpered the invalid. “I didn’t mean any harm. You said you wanted to help me. And oh, if you only knew what a help it is to be able to speak out for once in my life without fear of that terrible will power of Caleb’s choking me silent! I don’t hate you now. I didn’t as soon as I saw you cared nothing for him. For you don’t. I see more than people think. And—I suppose it’s wicked of me to even think such things—but when I die it will be good to know Caleb will for once be balked in his wishes; for you’ll never marry him. I know that.” “I can’t listen to you!” exclaimed Anice. “You are not yourself or you wouldn’t talk so. Please——” “May I come in?” Both women, with the wondrous art which their sex alone can master, had dropped into conventional attitudes with their backs to the light by the time the intruder’s first word was spoken. As Clive Standish passed through the portières into the library, he saw only that its two occupants were seated, one reading, the other crocheting, in polite boredom, each evidently quite willing that their prolonged session of dreary small talk should be interrupted. “Good evening, Aunt Letty,” said Clive, as he stooped over the excited woman and kissed her. “I called to see Mr. Conover on a matter of some importance. The footman was not sure whether he could—or would—see me or not. So, while I was waiting for him to find out, I thought I heard your voice in here and ventured in. Good evening, Miss Lanier. You’ll pardon my left hand?” The right he held behind him, yet in one of the mirrors Anice could see the knuckles were swathed in plaster. The hand he offered, too, was bruised, cut and discolored.