"You do, and so I shall answer the questions. I have never seen her in my life. But these last few weeks I have thought I ought to try, so I wrote and offered to go to her, and I have this evening had the first letter she has ever written to me. In this letter"--she drew it half out of her pocket--"she declines to see me, and she exhorts me to a vegetable diet." There was a moment in which her face looked the embodiment of sarcasm, then something gentler came athwart it. He had never come so near to liking her before. He could no longer think of her as all the more dangerous on account of her attractions; she was a suffering, cruelly-treated woman. It is dangerous to see too much of one's enemies: Edmund was growing much softer. "But why," she went on with quiet dignity, "did you try so hard to break through her seclusion?" It was a dreadful question--a question impossible to answer. He was silent; then he said-- "Dear lady, I told you I did not want you to satisfy what you supposed to be my wish for knowledge, and I am very sorry that now, at least, I cannot tell you why I wished to see Madame Danterre." Naturally, it never struck him for a moment that Molly might think it was for her sake that he had tried to see her mother, as he had not known of her existence when he was in Florence. But his reticence made her incline much more to that idea. She almost blushed in the firelight. Edmund was feeling baffled and sorry. If there were another will--and he still maintained that there was another--certainly Miss Dexter knew nothing about it. He had wronged her; and after all what reasonable grounds had there been for his suspicions as to her guilt? "I suppose," he thought, "Rose is right, and will-hunting is demoralising, or 'not healthy,' as she calls it." But he had been too long silent. "It is very hard on you to get such a letter," he said, with a ring of true sympathy in his voice and more expression than usual in his face. "I wish I had not come in and disturbed you; I wish you had a woman friend here instead." "I don't," said Molly quickly. "Don't go yet. I can say as little as I like with you, and then I'm going to church to hear the _bon petit pretre_ preach." "He will lure you to Rome." "Perhaps." "Well, I think there's a good deal to be said for Rome." "Don't you mind people joining it?" she asked, a little eagerly. "No, I like it better than Ritualism." "But Lady Rose is a Ritualist." "I believe you will find angels few and far between in any religion." "It must be nice to be an angel," mused Molly. He had risen to go; he thought he might still find Rose at home and he wanted to speak to her, yet he was in no hurry to be gone. "Don't give me an excuse for compliments; I warn you, you will repent it if you do," he said warmly; and then, after a little hesitation which might well have been mistaken for an effort at self-command in a moment of emotion, he added in a low voice--