A villain! Arthur Vavasour--the “fine,” noble-hearted, brilliant gentleman to whom this simple-minded Honor had so looked up, and of the loss of whose friendship she had been so afraid that she had “led him on”--the silly woman knew she had--to fancy that she loved him better than she did her husband--was he in very truth a man to be avoided, shunned, and looked on with contempt? She could not, did not think it possible. He was accusing himself unjustly, working on her compassion, speaking without reflection: anything and everything she could believe possible rather than that her friend should deserve the odious epithet which had just, to her extreme surprise, smote upon her ears. Before, however, she could give words to that surprise, Arthur spoke again, and with an impetuosity which almost seemed to take away his breath poured forth his explanation of the text. “Yes, a villain! You may well look astonished; and I expect, when you know all, that you will turn your back upon me, Honor, as all the world must; that is, if the world _has_ to be taken into my confidence, which I still trust it will not be. There are extenuating circumstances though, as the juries say; and perhaps, if I had been better _raised_, I shouldn’t have turned out such an out-and-out bad ’un as I have!” He stopped for a moment to gulp down a sigh, and then proceeded thus: “I think I told you once before how awfully I was in debt, and that it was the burden of debt that drove me into marrying poor little Sophy Duberly--the best girl in the world; but I _did not_ love her (more shame for me), and whose affection, poor child, is so much more of a torment than a pleasure to me. Well, enough of that: the worst is to come; and if _you_ can tell me, after hearing it, that I am _not_ a villain, why, I am a luckier dog, that’s all, than I think myself at present!” Honor, feeling called upon to make some response, muttered at this crisis a few words which sounded like encouragement; but Arthur, too entirely engrossed with his _mea culpa_ to heed this somewhat premature absolution, continued hurriedly to pour forth the history of his sin.