"And poor child, she is ill, and ... penniless." Margaret's heart beat to suffocation. She had married for this one thing, and had not got what she had considered a certainty. "It is cruel to keep us apart," she said, choking back her tears, feeling helpless and miserable. "It is a sad position," he said, with his hateful little laugh. "But perhaps excellent Mr. Sandford will provide for her." "And you know," said Margaret, indignantly, "you know that our being at Torbreck was because Grace could not bear the position he put her in. She cannot bear him!" "How unfortunate! Well, you see, I do not like her at all. Why should I? She has never shown me decent civility, and I do not choose to have her. It is better to be frank with you. I hate all her d----d airs and graces." Margaret's tears were falling fast. Stifling her emotion she summoned up her courage. She said, "I have never asked you for money, will you give me some now?" "To send to her--certainly not." "You will not give any money," she exclaimed, in despair. "No, I will do nothing of the kind. Now, Margaret, you had better understand me once for all. When I married you I intended to win your love. I did not expect you ever to give me what I gave you. You have never once given me a spontaneous mark of affection. You look as though you were brokenhearted, and a martyr. Do you suppose that I did not know that you only married me because that precious sister of yours had chosen to quarrel with her bread and butter? But I did not care. I thought kindness and affection would win something in return. I consider that, as you fail in your side of the bargain, I have every right to fail in mine." And with one of his detestable laughs he left her to think over his words. Margaret went to the open window and looked on the garden and the river--brilliant in the sunshine and seeming to mock at her despair. There was that painful grain of truth in his words that filled her with humiliation. Was she not justly punished? She had done wrong; could good ever come out of evil? She might live long, and all her life she was to have this terrible companionship. She clasped her hands together, and tried to think calmly and prayerfully what she could do now, when the silence of humanity amidst the throb and ripple of the river was broken, and a well-remembered voice was calling her by name. "Margaret, my Margaret, I have found you! I am free to tell you the end of my story. I tried to tell you the beginning. I love you! My darling, I love you! Can you love me in return!" A faint cry burst from Margaret's lips. For a few moments the present and all the horrors of her position fell away from her memory. He stood beside her, and, reading nothing but the flood of joy with which she heard his words in her face, he clasped her in his arms.