The little face convulsed with passion raised an intolerable distress in Marcella. "Yes, he came to see me," she said, her dark eyes, full of pain, full, too, once more, of entreaty, fixed upon her interrogator. "But do let me tell you! I never saw anyone in deeper trouble--trouble about you--trouble about himself." Letty burst into a wild laugh. "Of course! No doubt he went to complain of me--that I flirted--that I ill-treated his mother--that I spent too much money--and a lot of other pleasant little things. Oh! I can imagine it perfectly. Besides that, I suppose he went to be thanked. Well, he deserved _that_. He has thrown away his career to please you; so if you didn't thank him, you ought! Everybody says his position in Parliament now isn't worth a straw--that he must resign--which is delightful, of course, for his wife. And I saw it all from the beginning--I understood exactly what you _wanted_ to do at Castle Luton--only I couldn't believe then--I was only six weeks married--" A wave of excitement and self-pity swept over her. She broke off with a sob. Marcella's heart was wrung. She knew nothing of the real Letty Tressady. It was the wife as such, slighted and set aside, that appealed to the imagination, the remorse of this happy, this beloved woman. She rose quickly, she held out her hands, looking down upon the little venomous creature who had been pouring these insults upon her. "Don't--_don't_ believe such things," she said, with sobbing breath. "I never wronged you consciously for a moment. Can't you believe that Sir George and I became friends because we cared for the same kind of questions; because I--I was full of my husband's work and everything that concerned it; because I liked to talk about it, to win him friends. If it had ever entered my mind that such a thing could pain and hurt you--" "Where have you sent him to-day?" cried Letty, peremptorily, interrupting her, while she drew her handkerchief fiercely across her eyes. Instantly Marcella was conscious of the difficulty of explaining her own impulse and Maxwell's action. "Sir George told me," she said, faltering, "that he must go away from London immediately, to think out some trouble that was oppressing him. Only a few minutes after he left our house we heard from Mrs. Allison that she was in great distress about her son. She came, in fact, to beg us to help her find him. I won't go into the story, of course; I am sure you know it. My husband and I talked it over. It occurred to us that if Maxwell went to him--to Sir George--and asked him to do us and her this great kindness of going to Ancoats and trying to bring him back to his mother, it would put everything on a different footing. Maxwell would get to know him,--as I had got to know him. One would find a way--to silence the foolish, unjust things--that have been said--I suppose--I don't know--"