managed to put off paying--then I borrowed small sums here and there. But that couldn’t last. And all the while I had to keep on looking pretty and prosperous, or else he began to worry, and think we were ruined, and wonder what would become of me if he didn’t get well. By the time you came I was desperate--I would have done anything, anything! He thought the money came from my Portuguese stepmother. She really was rich, as it happens. Unluckily my poor father tried to invest her money, and lost it all; but when they were first married she sent a thousand dollars--and all the rest, all you gave me, I built on that.” She paused pantingly, as if her tale were at an end. Gradually her consciousness of present things returned, and she saw Henry Prest, as if far off, a small indistinct figure looming through the mist of her blurred eyes. She thought to herself: “He doesn’t believe me,” and the thought exasperated her. “You wonder, I suppose,” she began again, “that a woman should dare confess such things about herself--” He cleared his throat. “About herself? No; perhaps not. But about her husband.” The blood rushed to her forehead. “About her husband? But you don’t dare to imagine--?” “You leave me,” he rejoined icily, “no other inference that I can see.” She stood dumbfounded, and he added: “At any rate, it certainly explains your extraordinary coolness--pluck, I used to think it. I perceive that I needn’t have taken such precautions.” She considered this. “You think, then, that he knew? You think, perhaps, that I knew he did?” She pondered again painfully, and then her face lit up. “He never knew--never! That’s enough for me--and for you it doesn’t matter. Think what you please. He was happy to the end--that’s all I care for.” “There can be no doubt about your frankness,” he said with pinched lips. “There’s no longer any reason for not being frank.” He picked up his hat, and studiously considered its lining; then he took the gloves he had laid in it, and drew them thoughtfully through his hands. She thought: “Thank God, he’s going!” But he set the hat and gloves down on a table, and moved a little nearer to her. His face looked as ravaged as a reveller’s at daybreak. “You--leave positively nothing to the imagination!” he murmured. “I told you it was useless--” she began; but he interrupted her: “Nothing, that is--if I believed you.” He moistened his lips again, and tapped them with his handkerchief. Again she had a whiff of the eau de Cologne. “But I don’t!” he proclaimed. “Too many memories ... too many ... proofs, my dearest ...” He stopped, smiling somewhat convulsively. She saw that he imagined the smile would soothe her. She remained silent, and he began once more, as if appealing to her against her own verdict: “I know better, Lizzie. In spite of everything, _I know you’re not that kind of woman_.” “I took your money--”