"True, sir. I did forget that the poor miller's child had no right to obtrude her comeliness in the presence of the banker's daughter. I confess my 'high crime and misdemeanor' against the pet of fortune, and await my condign punishment. Is it your sovereign will that I shear my shining locks like royal Berenice, and offer them in propitiation? Or, does it seem 'good, meet, and your bounden duty,' to have me promptly inoculated with small-pox, for the destruction of my skin, which is unjustifiably smoother and clearer than--" "Hush, hush!" He laid his hand over her lips, and, for a while, there was an awkward pause. "If it were only possible to inoculate your heart with a little genuine womanly charity,--if it were possible to persuade you to adopt as your rule of conduct that golden one which Christ gave as a patent of peace to all who followed it. But it is futile, hopeless. You will not, you will not,--and my fluttering dove is at the mercy of a famished eagle, already poised to swoop. I 'reckoned without my host' when I so confidently appealed to your magnanimity, to your feminine integrity of soul. You are a 'deaf adder that stoppeth her ear.'" "Which will not 'hearken to the voice of the charmer, charm he never so wisely.' Dr. Grey, what has the pampered heiress, the happy _fiancee_ of that handsome man upstairs, to fear from the poverty-stricken daughter of a miller, who you conscientiously inform your guest passed from time to eternity through the gate opened by delirium tremens. Mark you, my 'adder ears' have not been sealed all the evening." She had taken his hand from her lips, and thrown it from her. "People who condescend to listen to conversations that are not intended for them, generally deserve the punishment of hearing unpleasant truths discussed. Salome, our interview is at an end." "Not yet. Do you sincerely desire to see Muriel Mr. Granville's wife?" "I do, because I know that she is strongly attached to him." "And you are sufficiently generous to sacrifice your happiness, in order to promote hers? Oh, marvellous magnanimity!" "Your insinuation is beneath my notice." "How long have you known of her engagement?" "Since the first interview I had with her, after her father's death." "Let me see your face, Dr. Grey. If truth has not been hunted out of the earth, it took refuge in your eyes. There, I am satisfied. You never loved her. I think I must have been insane, or I would not have imagined it possible. No, no; she never touched your heart, save with a feeling of compassion. Don't go, I want to say something to you. Sit down, and let me think." She walked up and down the room for ten minutes, and, with his face bowed on his hand, Dr. Grey watched and waited. Finally he stooped to pick up the crushed rose on the floor, and then she came back and stood before him.