"Oh—it's nothing. I can't explain. Don't bother about it. It's no use. It can't be helped. And it doesn't really matter."
"I've been thinking," said Susan. "I understand a great many things I didn't know I'd noticed—ever since I was a baby. But what I don't understand——" She drew a long breath, a cautious breath, as if there were danger of awakening a pain. "What I don't understand is—why. And—you must tell me all about it. . . . Was my mother bad?"
"Not exactly bad," Ruth answered uncertainly. "But she did one thing that was wicked—at least that a woman never can be forgiven for, if it's found out."
"Did she—did she take something that didn't belong to her?"
"No—nothing like that. No, she was, they say, as nice and sweet as she could be—except—— She wasn't married to your father."
Susan sat in a brown study. "I can't understand," she said at last. "Why—she must have been married, or—or—there wouldn't have been me."
Ruth smiled uneasily. "Not at all. Don't you really understand?"
Susan shook her head.
"He—he betrayed her—and left her—and then everybody knew because you came."
Susan's violet-gray eyes rested a grave, inquiring glance upon her cousin's face. "But if he betrayed her—— What does 'betray' mean? Doesn't it mean he promised to marry her and didn't?"