"Affected, but irresolute still, I took her hand and carried it to my lips.
"'Let me thank you,' said I, 'for glimpses into a nature so noble and womanly that I am saved in this hour from cursing all womankind.'
"Ah, how she sighed.
"'You are good,' she murmured. 'You have deserved a better fate. But it is the lot of goodness and truth ever to meet with misappreciation and disdain. Here, here, only,' and she struck her breast with her clenched right hand, 'lie the rewards for honesty, long-suffering, and tenderness. In the world without there is nothing.'
"Tears, which I could not restrain, welled up to my eyes. I could never have wept for my own suffering, but for hers it seemed both natural and real. Ah, why had she thrown the treasures of her heart away upon a fool? Why had she given the trust of her heart to a villain? I opened my lips to speak; she saw his name faltering on my tongue, and stopped me.
"'Don't!' she breathed. 'I know what you would say and I cannot bear it. I was motherless, fatherless, almost friendless, and I relied upon the wisdom of an aunt, whose judgment was, perhaps, not all that it should have been. But it is too late now for regrets. I have launched my boat, and it must sail on; only—you are an honest man and will respect my confidence—was it Mr. Urquhart I saw on the outskirts of the crowd to-day?'
"I bowed. I knew she had not asked because she had any doubts as to the fact of his being there, but because she wanted to see if I had recognized him and owed any of my misery to that fact.
"'It was he,' said I, and said no more.
"The mask fell from her countenance. She clasped her hands together till they showed white as marble.
"'Oh! we are four miserable ones!' she cried. 'He—'