“Nor mine,” confessed Lydia, after a moment.
“I did not know that you and Frederic were in love with each other until I had been here for some time,” Mrs Brood explained, suddenly fretful.
Lydia stared hard at the soft white cheek that lay exposed below the black crown of hair.
“What had that to do with it?”
“A great deal more than you can imagine,” said the other, looking up into Lydia's face with a curious gleam in her eyes.
“You admit, then, that you deliberately———”
“I admit nothing, except that I am sorry to have made you unhappy.”
“What kind of a woman are you?” burst out Lydia's indignant soul. “Have you no conception of the finer, nobler———”
Yvonne deliberately put her hand over the girl's lips, checking the fierce outburst. She smiled rather plaintively as Lydia tried to jerk her head to one side in order to continue her reckless indictment.
“You shall not say it, Lydia. I am not all that you think I am. No, no; a thousand times no. God pity me, I am more accursed than you may think with the finer and nobler instincts. If it were not so, do you think I should be where I am now—cringing here like a beaten child? No, you cannot understand—you never will understand. I shall say no more. It is ended. I swear on my soul that I did not know you were Frederic's sweetheart. I did not know———”