"Do you know what it has all been for me, Mary?" he asked, halting before her, his brow flushed, his lips just as much agitated as hers. "Do you guess what it is? Every ray of sunshine went out of my life with you." "At the time you--you may have thought that," she tremblingly answered. "But why recall it? The sun has surely begun to shine for you again." "Never in this world. Never will it shine as it did then." "Nay, but that, in the face of facts, is scarcely credible," she rejoined, striving to get up as much calmness, and to speak as quietly, as though Mr. Blake-Gordon had never been more to her than an acquaintance or friend; nerving herself to answer him now as such. "You are, I believe, about to"--a cough took her just there, and she suddenly put her hand to her throat--"marry Agatha." "It is true. At least, partially true." "Partially?" "For Heaven's sake, Mary, don't speak to me in that coldly indifferent tone!" he passionately broke in. "I cannot bear it from you." "How would you have me speak?" she asked, rapidly regaining her self-possession; and her tone was certainly kind, rather than cold, though her words were redolent of calm reasoning. "The past is past, you know, and circumstances have entirely changed. It will be better to meet them as such: to regard them as they are." "Yes, they are changed," he answered bitterly. "You have made yourself into a lay-nun----" "Nay, not that," she interrupted with a smile. "A Sister of Charity, then"--pointing to her grey dress. "And I, as the world says, am to espouse Agatha Mountsorrel." "But surely that is true." "It is true in so far as that I have asked her to be my wife: That I should live to say that to you of another woman, Mary! She has accepted me. But, as to the marriage, I hope it will not take place yet awhile. I do not press for it." "You shall both have my best and truest prayers for your happiness," rejoined Mary, her voice again slightly trembling. "Agatha will make you a good wife. The world calls her haughty; but she will not be haughty to her husband." "How coolly you can contemplate it!" he cried, in reproach and pain. Just for one single moment, in her heart's lively anguish, the temptation assailed her to tell him what it really was to her, and how deeply she loved him still. She threw it behind her, a faint smile parting her lips. "William, you know well that what I say is all I can say. I am wedded to the life I have chosen; you will soon be wedded actually to another than me. Nothing remains for us in common: save the satisfaction of experiencing good wishes for the welfare of the other." "It is not love, or any feeling akin to it, that has caused me to address Agatha Mountsorrel----" he was beginning; but she interrupted him with decision. "I would rather not hear this. It is not right of you to say it."