"Well, I will leave it there. Only, Fenwick, understand this: my husband was young and generous and noble-hearted. Had I trusted him, I believe all might have gone well, even though he...." She hesitated again, and then cancelled something unsaid. "The concealment was my fault--the mistrust. That was all. Nothing else was my _fault_." As she says the words in praise of her husband she finds it a pleasure to let her eyes rest on the grave, handsome, puzzled face that, after all, really is _his_. She catches herself wondering--so oddly do the undercurrents of mind course about--where he got that sharp white scar across his nose. It was not there in the old days. She looks at him until he, too, looks up, and their eyes meet. "Well, then," she says, "I will tell you no more. Blame me as little as possible." And to this repetition of her previous words he says again, "I cannot blame you," very emphatically. But Mrs. Nightingale felt perplexed at his evident sincerity; would rather he should have indulged in truisms, we were not all of us perfect, and so forth. When she spoke again, some bars of the music later, she took for granted that his mind, like hers, was still dwelling on his last words. She felt half sorry she had, so to speak, switched off the current of the conversation. "If you will think over what I have told you, Fenwick, you will see that you cannot help doing so." "How can that be?" "Surely! My husband sought to divorce me, and was himself absolutely blameless. How can you do otherwise than blame me?" "Partly--only partly--because I see you are keeping back something--something that would exonerate you. I cannot believe you were to blame." "Listen, Fenwick! As I said, I cannot tell you the whole; and the Major, who is the only man alive who knows all the story, will, I know, refuse to tell you anything, even if you ask him, and that I wish you not to do." "I should not dream of asking him." "Well, he would refuse. I know it. But I want you to know all I can tell you. I do not want any groundless excuses made for me. I will not accept any absolution from any one on a false pretence. You see what I mean." "I see perfectly. I am not sure, though, that you see my meaning. But never mind that. Is there anything further you would really like me to know?" She waited a little, and then answered, keeping her eyes always fixed on Fenwick: "Yes, there is."