"Quite right, my dear: I'm a rank bigot--about that sort of thing!" and Mrs. Gereth jerked her head at the contents of the house. "I've never denied it. I'd kidnap--to save them, to convert them--the children of heretics. When I know I'm right I go to the stake. Oh, he may burn me alive!" she cried with a happy face. "Did he abuse me?" she then demanded. Fleda had remained there, gathering in her purpose. "How little you know him!" Mrs. Gereth stared, then broke into a laugh that her companion had not expected. "Ah, my dear, certainly not so well as you!" The girl, at this, turned away again--she felt she looked too conscious; and she was aware that, during a pause, Mrs. Gereth's eyes watched her as she went. She faced about afresh to meet them, but what she met was a question that reinforced them. "Why had you a 'delicacy' as to speaking of Mona?" She stopped again before the bench, and an inspiration came to her. "I should think _you_ would know," she said with proper dignity. Blankness was for a moment on Mrs. Gereth's brow; then light broke--she visibly remembered the scene in the breakfast-room after Mona's night at Poynton. "Because I contrasted you--told him _you_ were the one?" Her eyes looked deep. "You were--you are still!" Fleda gave a bold dramatic laugh. "Thank you, my love--with all the best things at Ricks!" Mrs. Gereth considered, trying to penetrate, as it seemed; but at last she brought out roundly: "For you, you know, I'd send them back!" The girl's heart gave a tremendous bound; the right way dawned upon her in a flash. Obscurity indeed the next moment engulfed this course, but for a few thrilled seconds she had understood. To send the things back "for her" meant of course to send them back if there were even a dim chance that she might become mistress of them. Fleda's palpitation was not allayed as she asked herself what portent Mrs. Gereth had suddenly perceived of such a chance: that perception could come only from a sudden suspicion of her secret. This suspicion, in turn, was a tolerably straight consequence of that implied view of the propriety of surrender from which, she was well aware, she could say nothing to dissociate herself. What she first felt was that if she wished to rescue the spoils she wished also to rescue her secret. So she looked as innocent as she could and said as quickly as possible: "For me? Why in the world for me?" "Because you're so awfully keen." "Am I? Do I strike you so? You know I hate him," Fleda went on. She had the sense for a while of Mrs. Gereth's regarding her with the detachment of some stern, clever stranger. "Then what's the matter with you? Why do you want me to give in?" Fleda hesitated; she felt herself reddening. "I've only said your son wants it. I haven't said _I_ do." "Then say it and have done with it!"