"Oh! she loved him--she loved him far too much," Sir Arthur answered testily. "I cannot understand, I never shall be able to understand, how a woman can throw away all her heart and life, on a man who is totally unworthy of her." Back into Christina's mind flashed the remembrance of words Margaret had spoken long before: "You don't know what it is to care so much for a man, that no matter what he is or does, he is your world, your whole world," but it was Cicely, not she who answered sagely-- "I don't believe a man can ever really understand the way a woman loves. A woman's love is made up of so many ingredients, she herself can hardly analyse it, and no man could ever begin to get near its true analysis." Sir Arthur looked at her with the kindly smile of one who listens to the prattling of a child, then resumed his own train of thought and words, as if she had not spoken at all. "My brother-in-law was a perpetual source of anxiety to me," he said; "not that I knew him. I only saw him once, and I was not favourably impressed on that occasion; but I can honestly say that until I heard he was in his grave, I had no really quiet moments." "I know nothing of the story," Cicely said; "I have only heard you speak of your brother-in-law, as if the subject was a painful one. I do not even know his name." "He was a Russian by birth--no, don't go, there need be no secret about the matter, certainly not from you, who were so good to my poor sister," Sir Arthur said, as Fergusson showed signs of leaving the room. "Max Petrovitch was his real name, and my sister originally met him at the house of friends in town. He was then closely connected with the Young Russia movement--or rather, to call things by their true names, he was a red-hot Nihilist. Margaret--went with him to Siberia, you know." Cicely uttered an exclamation, but Sir Arthur went on without pause. "Yes, she went to Siberia with him. I don't know on what precise count he was exiled, but he was always on the side of revolutionary methods, as against those of law and order, and although I believe--I do firmly believe--that he never had a hand in any scheme of assassination, still, he was tarred with the pitch-black brush of anarchy. There is no doubt that the time in Siberia sowed the seeds of Margaret's ill-health; it sapped her strength and vitality; it was--the beginning of the end. Her maid Elizabeth has told me the truth about it all." He was silent for a few seconds before resuming.