“Let us dismiss the whole matter!” he said. “I wish I had not told you. It is quite unimportant.” “I fear I have never quite appreciated the full extent of your kindness.” she said, “nor how fond you were of Stephen, your friendship for him. I must have seemed very unreasonable to you in many ways, at first.” Benson was silent. He feared to speak. He felt he could not continue in the false position in which she was placing him. “You will let me return what you have expended,” Virginia continued. “Do you find the obligation so irksome?” he asked, with a touch of exasperation in his tone. “Any obligation must be irksome when one is so uncertain as to how it is to be met!” “But you see that it has not worried me!” “You are too kind to let it, too generous in your feeling— “No,” he said, with sudden deliberation, “I am not so generous as you think. I wanted you to know that I was your friend. As your friend, all that I could do was a privilege; I gained more than I gave.” Instinctively she drew back at the turn the conversation had taken. Her glance as it sought his face, lost something of its former frankness, but she had not been alarmed by anything he had said, for his meaning was still remote from his words; and she was so unsuspicious of him, had come so to regard him only as her dead husband's friend; and measured by the standard set by her own love, it was not strange that Stephen should have inspired such a friendship, or that it should extend in some lesser degree even to her; indeed, it was the most natural thing in the world. But Benson had noted the subtle alteration in her manner, no change there ever escaped him; he felt that he had betrayed his secret. “Friendship has its limitations, that is the unfortunate thing about it. It is not like—not like other things,” he finished abruptly. She looked up quickly into his face; and what she saw there, caused her steady glance to waver. Her eyes fell. Perhaps she had not understood; perhaps—but her cheeks coloured, not with resentment, but with shame, at the thought that had laid hold of her. She rose from her chair, with all that dignity of manner in the presence of which he was wont to stand abashed and silent. “I have offended you!” he said. “Please let me explain!” “There is nothing to explain, you only meant to be kind, to spare me—” “Oh, not that!” he cried, with sudden recklessness. “That shall be as you wish—I had no right to argue the point with you!” She made a step toward the door. 0257 “Please!” he cried, “Mrs. Landray, you must let me speak!” She turned on him swiftly; her eyes wide with wonder at the change that had come over him. There was dead silence in the room. Now that he had spoken, now that circumstances had led him on until there was no turning back, he could have bitten off his tongue that had betrayed him.