"Then, of course, you can't repent," said Mary.
Hesper recovered herself a little.
"I am glad you see the thing as I do," she said.
"I don't see it at all as you do, ma'am," answered Mary, gently.
"Why!" exclaimed Hesper, taken by surprise, "what have I got to repent of?"
"Do you really want me to say what I think?" asked Mary.
"Of course, I do," returned Hesper, getting angry, and at the same time uneasy: she knew Mary's freedom of speech upon occasion, but felt that to draw back would be to yield the point. "What have I done to be ashamed of, pray?"
Some ladies are ready to plume themselves upon not having been guilty of certain great crimes. Some thieves, I dare say, console themselves that they have never committed murder.
"If I had married a man I did not love," answered Mary, "I should be more ashamed of myself than I can tell."
"That is the way of looking at such things in the class you belong to, I dare say," rejoined Hesper; "but with us it is quite different. There is no necessity laid upon you. Our position obliges us."