“That would be best,” said Sewell. She hesitated; the tears fell down upon her hands behind her veil; she no longer wiped them. “It's because I've often--heard you; because I know you will tell me what's true and right--” “Your own heart must do that,” said the minister, “but I will gladly help you all I can.” She did not heed him now, but continued as if rapt quite away from him. “If there was some one--something--if there was something that it would be right for you to do--to have, if there was no one else; but if there were some else that had a right first--” She broke off and asked abruptly, “Don't you think it is always right to prefer another--the interest of another to your own?” Sewell could not help smiling. “There is only one thing for us to do when we are in any doubt or perplexity,” he said cheerily, “and that is the unselfish thing.” “Yes,” she gasped; she seemed to be speaking to herself. “I saw it, I knew it! Even if it kills us, we must do it! Nothing ought to weigh against it! Oh, I thank you!” Sewell was puzzled. He felt dimly that she was thanking him for anguish and despair. “I'm afraid that I don't quite understand you.” “I thought I told you,” she answered, with a certain reproach, and a fall of courage in view of the fresh effort she must make. It was some moments before she could say, “If you knew that some one--some one who was--everything to you--and that you knew--believed--” At fifty it is hard to be serious about these things, and it was well for the girl that she was no longer conscious of Sewell's mood. “--Cared for you; and if you knew that before he had cared for you there had been some else--some else that he was as much to as he was to you, and that couldn't give him up, what--should you--” Sewell fetched a long sigh of relief; he had been afraid of a much darker problem than this. He almost smiled. “My dear child,”--she seemed but a child there before the mature man with her poor little love-trouble, so intricate and hopeless to her, so simple and easy to him--“that depends upon a great many circumstances.” He could feel through her veil the surprise with which she turned to him: “You said, whenever we are in doubt, we must act unselfishly.” “Yes, I said that. But you must first be sure what is really selfish--” “I _know_ what is selfish in this case,” said the girl with a sublimity which, if foolish, was still sublimity. “She is sick--it will kill her to lose him--You have said what I expected, and I thank you, thank you, _thank_ you! And I will do it! Oh, don't fear now but I shall; I _have_ done it! No matter,” she went on in her exaltation, “no matter how much we care for each other, now!”