"It behoves Mr Slow, for that very reason, to be the more anxious on your behalf; and, if you will believe me, Margaret, I am quite as anxious as he is. If you had remained with us, I could have discussed the matter with you from day to day; but, of course, I cannot do so while you are here." As he was talking in this way, everything with reference to their past intercourse came across her mind. She could not tell him that she had been anxious to see him, not with reference to the money, but that he might tell her that he did not find her guilty on that charge which her aunt had brought against her concerning Mr Maguire. She did not want assurances of solicitude as to her future means of maintenance. She cared little or nothing about her future maintenance, if she could not get from him one kind word with reference to the past. But he went on talking to her about Mr Slow, and the interest, and the property, and the law, till, at last, in her anger, she told him that she did not care to hear further about it, till she should be told at last what she was to do. "As I have got nothing of my own," she said, "I want to be earning my bread, and I think that the delay is cruel." "And do you think," said he, "that the delay is not cruel to me also?" She thought that he alluded to the fact that he could not yet obtain possession of the income for his own purposes. "You may have it all at once, for me," she said. "Have all what?" he replied. "Margaret, I think you fail to see the difficulties of my position. In the first place, my father is on his deathbed!" "Oh, John, I am sorry for that." "And, then, my mother is very bitter about all this. And how can I, at such a time, tell her that her opinion is to go for nothing? I am bound to think of my own children, and cannot abandon my claim to the property." "No one wants you to abandon it. At least, I do not." "What am I to do, then? This Mr Maguire is making charges against me." "Oh, John!" "He is saying that I am robbing you, and trying to cover the robbery by marrying you. Both my own lawyer, and Mr Slow, have told me that a plain statement of the whole case must be prepared, so that any one who cares to inquire may learn the whole truth, before I can venture to do anything which might otherwise compromise my character. You do not think of all this, Margaret, when you are angry with me." Margaret, hanging down her head, confessed that she had not thought of it. "The difficulty would have been less, had you remained at the Cedars." Then she again lifted her head, and told him that that would have been impossible. Let things go as they might, she knew that she had been right in leaving her aunt's house.