March stared at her perplexedly. What did the girl mean? And was this resolute, impassive woman of business the blushing trembler who, a month ago, could not deny her love for him? She was very serious now, but apparently very tranquil. “You would say, if you were not too kind-hearted, that this is what I am doing—what I have been doing for nearly ten years—and you would be right. It would not exculpate me in your opinion if I were to represent that Mr. Wayt’s profession is all that stands between his family and the poorhouse; that I do not habitually attend the church in which he officiates, and that my name has never appeared upon the record of any one of the parishes of which he has had charge since I became a member of his family. Mr. Wayt and I have not exchanged a syllable directly for over five years. I neither respect nor like him. He can never forgive my knowledge of his character, and my interference with his habits. These were confirmed before I came to my sister.” “Let me beg,” interposed March, “that you will not go on with what cannot but be distressing to you. You need no justification in my sight. If you will permit me to call to-morrow morning we can talk matters over calmly and at leisure. It is late, and you have had a severe nervous strain.” “Unless you insist upon the postponement I would rather speak now, while my mind is steady in the purpose to make an end of subterfuge and concealment. I _am_ weary, but it is of falsehoods, acted and spoken. Hester has told me of your generous pretense of misunderstanding the nature of Mr. Wayt’s attack. There it is again!”—relapsing into her usual tone, and with whimsical vexation that made March smile. “I am afraid I have forgotten how to be frank! My poor sister’s eager talk of ‘attacks’ and ‘seizures’ and ‘turns’ and ‘sunstroke’ and ‘constitutional headaches’ has unbalanced my perceptions of right and wrong.” “You cannot expect me to agree with you there?” the suppressed smile becoming visible. She was not to be turned aside from the straight track. “Nothing so perverts conscience as a systematic course of concealment, even when it is practiced for what seem to be noble ends. I have felt this for a long time. Lately the sense of guilt has been insupportable. It may be relief—if not expiation—to tell the truth in the plainest terms I can use. It may leave me more wretched than I am now. But right is right.” Her chin trembled and she raised her hand to cover it. Her admirable composure was smoldering excitement, kept under by will and the conscience whose rectitude she undervalued. With a sub-pang, March perceived that this disclosure was not a confidence, but a duty.