"Ask her pardon!" repeated Miriam, indignantly. "Surely you are not taking her part—the part of one who would have blackened the character of your only sister!"
"Listen to me quietly, dear Miriam, for a minute, and, if you can do so, answer me calmly. Did Caroline, or did she not, believe that she had seen the silver knife in your box?"
"She must have known me well enough to be sure that I would have scorned to touch it!" cried Miriam, evading the question.
"People readily believe what they wish to be true," observed Hamil.
"What do you mean? Why should Caroline wish me to be a thief?" asked Miriam, abruptly, looking with surprise into the face of the soldier.
"By your own account, the knife was lost, had been searched for in vain; suspicion must have lain on Caroline herself; she naturally was only too glad to turn it on another, and you yourself own that the paper cutter was like your own, which she had chanced to see in your box. And you must take another thing into account, dear Miriam. Caroline has not been able to live for months with you, without finding out that your ideas of duty are very much higher than hers. She must begin to suspect that if you are right, she must be wrong, and such suspicion is very unpleasant. The life of every consistent Christian is a rebuke to a godless world. I believe that this is the chief reason why the world is so ready to hate him, so eager to pick holes in his conduct. I daresay that it was a comfort to Caroline to think that you were no better than herself."
"I am glad that she cannot now have that comfort of thinking me dishonest," cried Miriam, who was half-amused, half-vexed, at the view of the subject taken by Hamil.
"But she can, and, I fear, does think you violent and passionate," observed the soldier. "Caroline knows that, though you keep your hands from picking and stealing, you certainly do not keep your tongue from evil-speaking."
Miriam felt hurt at the observation; had any one but, her twin brother made it, she would have been seriously angry.
She was silent for a minute, and then said, "You, who are so calm and good-tempered yourself that nothing ever ruffles you, cannot understand the difficulty of keeping down a quick, hot temper like mine."