"I shouldn't think such people's acquaintance worth making over again," said Letty. "How can you tell what it may be worth?" said Mary, "--they are so different from what they were? Their friendship may now be one that won't change so easily." "Ah! don't be hard on me, Mary. I have never ceased to love you." "I am _so_ glad!" answered Mary. "People don't generally take much to me--at least, not to come _near_ me. But you can _be_ friends without _having_ friends," she added, with a sententiousness she had inherited. "I don't quite understand you," said Letty, sadly; "but, then, I never could quite, you know. Tom finds me very stupid." These words strengthened Mary's suspicion, from the first a probability, that all was not going well between the two; but she shrunk from any approach to confidences with _one_ of a married pair. To have such, she felt instinctively, would be a breach of unity, except, indeed, that were already, and irreparably, broken. To encourage in any married friend the placing of a confidence that excludes the other, is to encourage that friend's self-degradation. But neither was this a fault to which Letty could have been tempted; she loved her Tom too much for it: with all her feebleness, there was in Letty not a little of childlike greatness, born of faith. But, although Mary would make Letty tell nothing, she was not the less anxious to discover, that she might, if possible, help. She would observe: side-lights often reveal more than direct illumination. It might be for Letty, and not for Mrs. Redmain, she had been sent. He who made time in time would show. "Are you going to be long in London, Mary?" asked Letty. "Oh, a long time!" answered Mary, with a loving glance. Letty's eyes fell, and she looked troubled. "I am so sorry, Mary," she said, "that I can not ask you to come here! We have only these two rooms, and--and--you see--Mrs. Helmer is not very liberal to Tom, and--because they--don't get on together very well--as I suppose everybody knows--Tom won't--he won't consent to--to--" "You little goose!" cried Mary; "you don't think I would come down on you like a devouring dragon, without even letting you know, and finding whether it would suit you!--I have got a situation in London." "A situation!" echoed Letty. "What can you mean, Mary? You haven't left your own shop, and gone into somebody else's?" "No, not exactly that," replied Mary, laughing; "but I have no doubt most people would think that by far the more prudent thing to have done." "Then I don't," said Letty, with a little flash of her old enthusiasm. "Whatever you do, Mary, I am sure will always be the best." "I am glad I have so much of your good opinion, Letty; but I am not sure I shall have it still, when I have told you what I have done. Indeed, I am not quite sure myself that I have done wisely; but, if I have made a mistake, it is from having listened to love more than to prudence." "What!" cried Letty; "you're married, Mary?"