Marjory read this innocent and natural letter with a buzzing of excited pulses in her ears, and a blaze of hot colour in her face. The mere fact that it was a letter from a woman moved her (naturally) as no other kind of secret could have done. Indeed what other kind of secret would have been worth considering in comparison? She drew a long breath when she had read it. Her face was scarlet, as if the shame (if shame there was) had been her own. And it was hardly possible for her, at least for the first moment, to realise that there might be no shame in it. To have felt so, would have been such a triumph over prejudice and over natural feeling as Marjory was not equal to. The bad writing, the bad spelling, the peasant dialect, struck her more strongly than the sentiments did. They seemed to imply vice--vice which to a young and pure-minded woman is the same as crime--nay, is the worst kind of crime. There was then, after all, a mystery in Tom’s life, and here it was; a vulgar degrading mystery--the kind of horror which people say is so common in the lives of young men, a suggestion which Marjory loathed as every woman ought to loath it. It filled her with disgust of Tom and of all men. She threw the paper out of her hand with a cry of indignant wrath, and then slowly, reluctantly, took it up again, unable to resist the fascination. The second time a different impression was made upon her mind. “I’ll make a good wife”--what did that mean? Marjory pondered over it with excitement, which was not calmed down by this new discovery. Had he really meant--was it possible he could have intended to make the writer of this letter his wife? His sister thrilled all over with an indignant movement of horror, Yes, I do not know how to excuse it--but Marjory, who had been blazing hot with shame at the idea of a disreputable connection on her brother’s part, felt a shiver of horror go over her at the thought that there might be no shame in it, that his mind might be honourable and his love pure, that he might have intended this woman, this peasant, this Isabell, to be her sister and his wife. Her eyes fixed on those words with a painful stare. “Good heavens, his wife!” and under her breath, in her throat, Marjory murmured, “Thank God!” Thank God for what? that Tom was dead? that he had not lived to carry that intention out? was this what she meant? She stopped short in absolute dismay, when her reason perceived to what length instinct and impulse had carried her.