"Now, don't talk to me like that, Claire, or you'll set me off crying my eyes blind, and I shall go home red and miserable, and Frank will find it all out." "He must be told." "Told?" cried May, starting up. "Told? If he is told, I'll go right down to the end of the pier and drown myself. He must never know, and papa must never know. Do you think I've kept this a secret for more than two years for them to be told?" "They will be sure to know." "Yes, if you tell them. Oh, Claire, Claire, I did think I could find help in my sister, now that I am in such terrible trouble." "I will help you all I can, May," said Claire sadly; "but they must know." "I tell you they must not," cried May angrily, and speaking like a spoiled child. "Frank would kill me, and as for poor, dear, darling papa, with all his troubles about getting you married and Morton settled, and Fred turning out so badly, it would kill him, and then you'd have a nice time of it, far worse than poor old mummy Teigne being killed." "Oh, hush, May!" said Claire, with a horrified look. "That moves you, does it, miss? Well, then, be reasonable. I don't know what to make of you of late, Claire; you seem to be so changed. Ah, you'll find the difference when you're a married woman." Claire gazed down at her, with the trouble and perplexity seeming to increase, while May Burnett arranged the folds of her dress, as she once more nestled in the corner of the old sofa, and seemed as if she were posing herself to be pitied and helped. Then she lifted her eyes towards the florid portrait on the wall, and sighed. "Poor Louis! How he did flatter me. But he always did that, and I suppose it was his flattering words made me love him so. I was very fond of him." "May," said Claire excitedly, "when was it you were married?" "Oh, it was such fun. It was while I was staying at Aunt Jerdein's, and taking the music lessons. I went out as usual, to go to Golden Square for my lesson as aunt thought, and Louis was waiting for me, and he took me in a hackney coach with straw at the bottom and mouldy old cushions, and one of the windows broken. And we went to such a queer old church somewhere in the city, and were married--a little old church that smelt as mouldy as the hackney coach; and the funny old clergyman took snuff all over his surplice, and he did mumble so." "And then?" "Oh, Louis left Saltinville, you know, when I went up to London, and gave lessons at Aunt Jerdein's, and we used to see as much of each other as we could, till he had to go back to Rome, and there, poor boy, you know he died of fever." Claire did not speak, but stood with her hands clasped before her, listening to the calm, cool, selfish words that seemed to come rippling out from the prettily-curved mouth as if it were one of the simplest and most matter-of-fact things in the world.