“What, Mark! If you do, Fanny, I’ll never, never, never speak to you again. Would you—when I have given you all my heart in true sisterly love?” Mrs. Robarts had to explain that she had not proposed to tell anything to Mark herself, and was persuaded, moreover, to give a solemn promise that she would not tell anything to him unless specially authorized to do so. “I’ll go into a home, I think,” continued Lucy. “You know what those homes are?” Mrs. Robarts assured her that she knew very well, and then Lucy went on: “A year ago I should have said that I was the last girl in England to think of such a life, but I do believe now that it would be the best thing for me. And then I’ll starve myself, and flog myself, and in that way I’ll get back my own mind and my own soul.” “Your own soul, Lucy!” said Mrs. Robarts, in a tone of horror. “Well, my own heart, if you like it better; but I hate to hear myself talking about hearts. I don’t care for my heart. I’d let it go—with this young popinjay lord or anyone else, so that I could read, and talk, and walk, and sleep, and eat, without always feeling that I was wrong here—here—here,” and she pressed her hand vehemently against her side. “What is it that I feel, Fanny? Why am I so weak in body that I cannot take exercise? Why cannot I keep my mind on a book for one moment? Why can I not write two sentences together? Why should every mouthful that I eat stick in my throat? Oh, Fanny, is it his legs, think you, or is it his title?” Through all her sorrow,—and she was very sorrowful,—Mrs. Robarts could not help smiling. And, indeed, there was every now and then something even in Lucy’s look that was almost comic. She acted the irony so well with which she strove to throw ridicule on herself! “Do laugh at me,” she said. “Nothing on earth will do me so much good as that; nothing, unless it be starvation and a whip. If you would only tell me that I must be a sneak and an idiot to care for a man because he is good-looking and a lord!” “But that has not been the reason. There is a great deal more in Lord Lufton than that; and since I must speak, dear Lucy, I cannot but say that I should not wonder at your being in love with him, only—only that—” “Only what? Come, out with it. Do not mince matters, or think that I shall be angry with you because you scold me.” “Only that I should have thought that you would have been too guarded to have—have cared for any gentleman till—till he had shown that he cared for you.”