"She wanted to know what right you had to meddle. She said you were not honest." "I took hold of them hard—I put them in the forefront. I made them work."!

She checked him with a gesture. "Don't tell me what she did!" She had colored up to her eyes, where, as with the effect of a blow in the face, she quickly felt the tears gathering. It was a sudden drop in her great flight, a shock to her attempt to watch over what Mona was entitled to. While she had been straining her very soul in this attempt, the object of her magnanimity had been pronouncing her "not honest." She took it all in, however, and after an instant was able to speak with a smile. She would not have been surprised to learn, indeed, that her smile was strange. "You had said a while ago that your mother and I quarreled about you. It's much more true that you and Mona have quarreled about me." "Did he tell you so?" Fleda asked.

"He hasn't told her so," Fleda said. "Ah," said Fleda, "I'm not so sure!" "I'm very, very tired." Mrs. Gereth's slow head-shake was tragic. "I couldn't do it again."