“Pardon me for distressing you, my dear Helen. It was a matter in which a man MUST be selfish,_ must_ in point of honour, _must_ in point of feeling, I owe to your candour not merely relief from what I could not endure and live, but relief from suspicion,--suspicion of the truth of one dearer to me than life.” Helen sat as if she had been transfixed. “I owe to you,” continued he, “the happiness of my whole future life.” “Then I am happy,” cried Helen, “happy in this, at all events, whatever may become of me.” She had not yet raised her eyes towards the general; she felt as if her first look must betray Cecilia; but she now tried to fix her eyes upon him as he looked anxiously at her, and she said, “thank you, thank you, General Clarendon! Oh, thank you for all the kindness you have shown me; but I am the more grieved, it makes me more sorry to sink quite in your esteem.” “To sink! You do not: your candour, your truth raises you----” “Oh! do not say that----” “I do,” repeated the general, “and you may believe me. I am incapable of deceiving you--this is no matter of compliment. Between friend and friend I should count a word, a look of falsehood, treason.” Helen’s tears stopped, and, without knowing what she did, she began hastily to gather up the packet of letters which she had let fall; the general assisted her in putting them into her bag, and she closed the strings, thanked him, and was rising, when he went on--“I beg your indulgence while I say a few words of myself.” She sat down again immediately. “Oh! as many as you please.” “I believe I may say I am not of a jealous temper.” “I am sure you are not,” said Helen. “I thank you,” said the general. “May I ask on what your opinion is founded?” “On what has now passed, and on all that I have heard from Lady Davenant.” He bowed. “You may have heard then, from Lady Davenant, of some unfortunate circumstances in my own and in a friend’s family which happened a short time before my marriage?” Helen said she had. “And of the impression these circumstances made on my mind, my consequent resolve never to marry a woman who had ever had any previous attachment?” Helen was breathless at hearing all this repeated. “Were you informed of these particulars?” said the general. “Yes,” said Helen, faintly. “I am not asking, Miss Stanley, whether you approved of my resolution; simply whether you heard of it?” “Yes--certainly.” “That’s well. It was on an understanding between Cecilia and myself on this point, that I married. Did you know this?” “Yes,” said Helen. “Some words,” continued the general, “once fell from Lady Davenant concerning this Colonel D’Aubigny which alarmed me. Cecilia satisfied me that her mother was mistaken. Cecilia solemnly assured me that she had never loved him.” The general paused.