"Oh," exclaimed Elsie with hasty recklessness, and her usual want of thought, "Grant had no heart to give anybody; all his love was centred on me; after the experience he had years ago, I don't suppose he could ever love any woman again—he is just that odd sort of character."
Elizabeth gave no sign of the blow which struck her this time cruelly on the heart; she drew her hand away from Elsie, lest its sudden coldness should rouse some suspicion of the truth in the girl's mind, and asked in a singularly quiet voice—
"What experience, Elsie?"
"Oh, I didn't mean to say that," she replied; "I am always letting things out by mistake; Grant would be really angry with me; don't ever mention it to him."
"I will not; but what experience has he had that can prevent a husband's giving his heart even to his own wife?"
"Dear me, I oughtn't to tell you; but you'd surely find it out sometime; only promise me not to open your lips."
"I promise," replied Elizabeth, a cold, gray shadow settling over her face, out of which all the bloom had faded.
"He had a friend, a cousin you know, that our rich old uncle had partly adopted, whom he was very, very fond of," pursued Elsie, "and he was engaged to be married into the bargain. This man treated him dreadfully—ran off with the girl Grant loved, and cheated him out of a great deal of money—money that he could not afford to lose, for he was not rich then. Grant was nearly mad. I was a little thing, but I remember it perfectly. When his uncle died he sent me to school, and started to Europe; he has been there all these four long years; but his cousin was punished; his uncle gave everything to Grant."
And of all this grief, this disappointment, he had never told her one word. Elsie spoke the truth—he had married her that his sister might have a companion, and his house a mistress.
A prouder woman than Elizabeth Mellen never existed; but she sat motionless and gave no sign, while her brief dream of happiness fell crushed and broken at her feet under this revelation.