"Oh," moaned Marie-Aimée, putting up the ever-willing hands, like a martyr in prayer, "don't ask me. And don't take it ill if I can't. It's not the same thing any longer." She let her head hang; "I haven't the heart for it to-night." "I am a beast!" said Mrs. Bronson heartily, and without adding a note further to the musical phrase she was in the middle of, jumped up, sick at herself. And feeling of so little importance before depths of woe such as she suspected near her that it mattered nothing whether she apologized, she pressed Marie-Aimée's hand with all her strength, and murmuring, "I will take myself away," made haste to be gone. Mrs. Bronson was conscious of a vast relief, by which she first learned in what suspense she had been living, when a few days later she recognized Marie-Aimée's hand-writing on a letter to her. She read: "I went, you see, after all. I am at my sister's, to remain with her and the dear children until I have thought further what I had better do. You were right in wishing me to go, though not perhaps for the reasons you gave. My thoughts are not at all clear upon the subject of the rightness or wrongness of what I was doing then, or what I have done since. I felt sure I was justified against the whole world, and even now I find no good argument against it. Only, it came home to me that I who used to love everyone and have only feelings of kindness towards others, was fast coming to hate everybody, myself most, and it seemed a sufficient sign. But you won't think that was quite all. I did also think of you, who perhaps--which of us knows her own heart?--care more than you believe. Very likely not. But on the barest possibility of the sort, how could I continue obstinately fixed in my position?