Magdalen was gaining some insight into the family history of the Greys, though how much of what she heard was true she could not tell. One thing, however, struck her forcibly. She knew that poor Jessie Morton’s second name was Magdalen, and from some source she had heard that Mr. Grey used frequently to call her by that name, which he preferred to Jessie, and when Mrs. Grey alluded to the beautiful woman whom her husband had loved better than his wife, she felt at once that it was Jessie to whom reference was made,—Jessie who had unwittingly made trouble in this family,—Jessie for whom the father would have called Alice, his first born, and for whom it would seem a later child was subsequently named. She wanted so much to ask questions herself, but a natural delicacy prevented her. She had no right to take advantage of a lunatic’s ravings and pry into family matters, so she sat very quiet for a few moments watching her patient, who said at last: “Yes, that brings it back in part. St. Luke’s Church, and mother, and Mr. and Mrs. Storms were sponsors, and we called one Madeline, and the other Magdalen after the woman that Arthur liked the best. Did you ever see her?” “I’ve seen her picture. I lived in her house,” Magdalen replied: “Tell me of her. Was she prettier than I am?—though how should you know that, when you’ve only seen the gray-haired, wrinkled, yellow hag they keep shut up so close at Beechwood? But I was handsome once, years ago, when mother made those shirts for Arthur and I did them up, and he came before they were done and sat by the table and watched me and said my hands were too small and pretty to handle that heavy iron,—they would look better with rings and diamonds, and he guessed he must get me some, I wore a pink gingham dress that day, and hated ironing and sewing after that, and wished I was a lady like those at the hotel where Arthur boarded, and I took a dollar and bought a ring and put it on my finger, and the next time he came he laughed and held my hand while he looked at it, and told me he would get a better one if I would go with him to the jeweller’s. Mother would not let me, and she had high words with him and ordered him away and called him a hard name,—a villain, who only wanted to ruin me. I was sick ever so long after that with something in my head, though not like what’s got into it since. Arthur sent me flowers and fruit and little notes, and came to the door to inquire, but still mother would not believe him true. When I was most well he wrote a letter asking me to meet him, and I ran away from mother and was married, and had the rings at last,—a diamond and emerald and the plain gold one,—and a white satin gown, and we travelled far and wide, and I looked like a queen when he brought me here to the Duchess and Lady Clarissa, and then to Penelope, who lived in New York, and wasn’t quite so bad, though she snubbed me some. I was not as happy as I thought I