She was stammering fearfully, and her face was scarlet with confusion and embarrassment. She was beginning already to realise the difficulty of her undertaking. "Won't you sit down?" he said, wheeling his tobacco-scented arm-chair out of its corner. He, too, was very much off his balance and bewildered by the situation, and his voice, though grave, was shaken. "No, thank you," she replied, with what she intended to be a haughty and distant bow. "I only came for a moment--as I happened to be saying good-bye to Mrs. M'Intyre. My sister is waiting for me. We are going home directly. I just wanted--I only wanted"--she lifted her eyes, full of wistful appeal, suddenly to his--"I wanted just to beg your pardon, that's all. I was very rude to you one day, and you have never forgiven me for it. I wanted to tell you that--that it was not what you thought it was--that I had a reason you did not know of for doing it, and that the moment after I was sorry--I have been sorry every hour of my life since, because I knew I had given you a wrong impression, and I have not been able to rectify it." "I don't quite understand--" he began. "No, I know--I know. And I can't explain. Don't ask me to explain. Only _believe_," she said earnestly, standing before him and leaning on the table, "that I have never, never been ungrateful for all the kindness you showed us when we came here a year ago--I have always been the same. It was not because I forgot that you were our best friend--the best friend we ever had--that I--that I"--her voice was breaking, and she was searching for her pocket-handkerchief--"that I behaved to you as I did." "Can't you tell me how it was?" he asked, anxiously. "You have nothing to be grateful for, Miss Patty--Miss Yelverton, I ought to say--and I cannot feel that I have anything to forgive. But I should like to know--yes, now that you have spoken of it, I think you ought to tell me--why you did it." "I cannot--I cannot. It was something that had been said of you. I believed it for a moment, because--because it looked as if it were true--but only for a moment. When I came to think of it I knew it was impossible." Paul Brion's keen face, that had been pale and strained, cleared suddenly, and his dark eyes brightened. He was quite satisfied with this explanation. He knew what Patty meant as well as if there had been but one word for a spade, and she had used it--as well, and even better than she could have imagined; for she forgot that she had no right or reason to resent his shortcomings, save on the ground of a special interest in him, and he was quick to remember it. "Oh, do sit down a moment," he said, pushing the arm-chair a few inches forward. He was trying to think what he might dare to say to her to show how thankful he was. It was impossible for her to help seeing the change in him.