For she liked to dine early on Sundays, and she always denied herself the pleasure of going to church in the afternoon, being one of the most unselfish persons I have ever met with. After a dinner not to be gainsaid, at any rate till supper-time, we sat in the garden and listened to the bells, and thought with pleasure of the congregation now going to have a hot time of it. I was full of tender recollections, for this was the very spot where Kitty had shown some delightful want of reason about Sally Chalker. And I told my aunt all about it now, with a sigh at the back of every smile. Then she laughed with superior wisdom, and no longer could contain herself. “I knew she was a jealous little puss. Every woman has her fault, almost as much as men have. It took me a long time to discover any fault in her, until I started that idea myself. To make up for the want of other faults, she has that one to an extreme, you see. And that is at the bottom of your present trouble, my poor boy. But she has carried it to an extreme, I admit. It seems a little too absurd.” “It is too absurd to be thought of twice,” I answered rather savagely; “my Kitty is not quite a fool. And she would have been something worse than a fool, if she had acted from that motive. She would have been unjust and cruel, not to afford me so much as a chance of clearing myself from wicked lies. Our married life was short indeed; but long enough for her to learn that I am not a scoundrel.” “Don’t be so hot, Kit. You have no idea what a woman’s mind is. She thought you, of course, a perfect angel, and herself not good enough to wipe your shoes. She was always humble, as you know; and that tyrant of a woman must have beaten into her poor head a bitter sense of her own defects. It is only natural, she would think, that this great wonder of a man should want some one better than poor me. And when some villain laid before her some strong evidence, we know not what, she would say to herself—‘It is as I thought. I will not trouble him to explain. I will leave him for a while, and perhaps his love will return, when he has lost me. With this in my heart, I could not bear to look at him, and know all the while he was longing to be rid of me. I will have no scene, which would only make him think even less of me than he does.’ And so she would go, without caring where.” “Possibly, aunt, some women might have done so. But not Kitty. She felt to her heart my affection for her; and she trusted me, as I trusted her. Do you suppose that if what you say had even seemed possible to me, I should have remained, as I have done, waiting for some news of her. I should have rushed up to every one, who had any motive for deceiving her, and taken them by the throat, and wrung their wicked, murderous lies out. No, it is something much worse than that. If Kitty had left me in petulance, would she have written these last words, would she have called me her ‘darling Kit’? See what I found this morning.”