"The maiden aunt's, the nicest, the dearest old woman that ever lived? I thought you had got rid of the maiden aunt." "If she does take it ill of you."!

"Oh dear, yes!" said Owen. "Has let herself go." Mrs. Gereth spoke as if she saw it in every detail.

"Then you ought to be ashamed of yourself!" Mrs. Gereth broke out with a change of note that showed how deep a passion underlay everything she had said. The poor woman, catching her companion's hand, however, the next moment, as if to retract something of this harshness, spoke more patiently. "Don't you understand, Fleda, how immensely, how devotedly, I've trusted you?" Her tone was indeed a supplication. "That's what he calls it," said Fleda. "No, 'she' won't see them." Then Fleda said, "What I mean is, for this dear one of ours, that if she had (as I know she did; it's in the very taste of the air!) a great accepted pain—"