After a long pause, and a struggle, as it were, for utterance, she faltered out, "Mr. Colden, you see I am very sick: this conduct has been very strange. Nothing,--I know nothing of what you have been saying. I wonder at your talking to me in this manner: you might as well address yourself in this style to one you never saw. What grounds can you have for suspecting me of any concern in this transaction?" "Ah, madam," replied I, "I see you have not strength of mind to confess a fault. Why will you compel me to produce the proof that you have taken an unauthorized part in Mrs. Talbot's concerns? Do you imagine that the love you bore her husband, even after his marriage, the efforts you used to gain his favour, his contemptuous rejection of your advances,--can you imagine that these things are not known? "Why you should endeavour to defraud the wife of her husband's esteem, is a question which your own heart only can answer. Why you should watch Mrs. Talbot's conduct, and communicate your discoveries, in anonymous letters and a hand disguised, to her mother, I pretend not to say. I came not to inveigh against the folly or malignity of such conduct. I came not even to censure it. I am not entitled to sit in judgment over you. My regard for mother and daughter makes me anxious to rectify an error fatal to their peace. There is but one way of doing this effectually, with the least injury to your character. I would not be driven to the necessity of employing _public_ means to convince the mother that the charge is false, and that you were the calumniator; means that will humble and disgrace you infinitely more than a secret interview and frank confession from your own lips. "To deny and to prevaricate in a case like this is to be expected from one capable of acting as you have acted; but it will avail you nothing. It will merely compel me to have recourse to means less favourable to you. My reluctance to employ them arises from regard to you, for I repeat that I have no enmity for you, and propose, in reality, not only Mrs. Talbot's advantage, but your own." I cannot paint the alarm and embarrassment which these words occasioned. Tears afforded her some relief, but shame had deprived her of all utterance. "Let me conjure you," resumed I, "to go with me this moment to Mrs. Fielder. In ten minutes all may be over. I will save you the pain of speaking. Only be present while I explain the matter. Your silent acquiescence will be all that I shall demand." "Impossible!" she exclaimed, in a kind of agony; "I am already sick to death! I cannot move a step on such a purpose. I don't know Mrs. Fielder, and can never look her in the face."