“And what came next?”

“Nothing. Nothing else has happened, except that Lady Ball came to me in Arundel Street, asking me to renounce him.”

“And you refused?”

“Yes; I would do nothing at her bidding. Why should I? She had been my enemy throughout, since she found that the money belonged to her son and not to me.”

“And all this time you have seen him frequently?”

“I have seen him sometimes about the business.”

“And he has never said a word to you about your engagement to him?”

“Never a word.”

“Nor you to him?”

“Oh, no! how could I speak to him about it?”

“I would have done so. I would not have had my heart crushed within me. But perhaps you were right. Perhaps it was best to be patient.”

“I know that I have been wrong to expect anything or to hope for anything,” said Margaret. “What right have I to hope for anything when I refused him while I was rich?”

“That has nothing to do with it.”

“When he asked me again, he only did it because he pitied me. I don’t want to be any man’s wife because he pities me.”

“But you accepted him.”

“Yes; because I loved him.”

“And now?” Again Miss Mackenzie sat silent, still moving her fingers among the locks upon her brow. “And now, Margaret?” repeated Mrs Mackenzie.

“What’s the use of it now?”

“But you do love him?”

“Of course I love him. How shall it be otherwise? What has he done to change my love? His feelings have changed, and I have no right to blame him. He has changed; and I hate myself, because I feel that in coming here I have, as it were, run after him. I should have put myself in some place where no thought of marrying him should ever have come again to me.”

“Margaret, you are wrong throughout.”

“Am I? Everybody always says that I am always wrong.”

“If I can understand anything of the matter, Sir John Ball has not changed.”

“Then, why—why—why?”

“Ah, yes, exactly; why? Why is it that men and women cannot always understand each other; that they will remain for hours in each other’s presence without the power of expressing, by a single word, the thoughts that are busy within them? Who can say why it is so? Can you get up and make a clean breast of it all to him?”

“But I am a woman, and am very poor.”

“Yes, and he is a man, and, like most men, very dumb when they have anything at heart which requires care in the speaking. He knows no better than to let things be as they are; to leave the words all unspoken till he can say to you, ‘Now is the time for us to go and get ourselves married;’ just as he might tell you that now was the time to go and dine.”

“But will he ever say that?”

“Of course he will. If he does not say so when all this business is off his mind, when Mr Maguire and his charges are put at rest, when the lawyers have finished their work, then come to me and tell me that I have deceived you. Say to me then, ‘Clara Mackenzie, you have put me wrong, and I look to you to put me right.’ You will find I will put you right.”