"I had better tell you now, that we may understand each other. I am not going to be married."
To Olga's voiceless astonishment she answered with a pale smile. Grave again, and gentle as she was firm, Irene continued.
"I am going to break my engagement. It has been a mistake. To-night I shall write a letter to Mr. Jacks, saying that I cannot marry him; when it has been sent, I shall tell my father."
Olga had begun to tremble. Her features were disturbed with an emotion which banished every sign of sorrow; which flushed her cheeks and made her eyes seem hostile in their fixed stare.
"How can you do that?" she asked, in a hard voice "How is it possible?"
"It seems to me far more possible then the alternative—a life of repentence."
"But—what do you mean, Irene? When everything is settled—when your house is taken—when everyone knows! What do you mean? Why shall you do this?"
The words rushed forth impetuously, quivering on a note of resentment. The flushed cheeks were turning pallid; the girl's breast heaved with indignant passion.
"I can't fully explain it to you, Olga." The speaker's tones sounded very soft and reasonable after that outbreak. "I am doing what many a girl would do, I feel sure, if she could find courage—let us say, if she saw clearly enough. It will cause confusion, ill-feeling, possibly some unhappiness, for a few weeks, for a month or two; then Mr. Jacks will feel grateful to me, and my father will acknowledge I did right; and everybody else who knows anything about it will have found some other subject of conversation."
"You are fond of somebody else?"