“Has—has he told you anything?”
“No, dear; he hardly ever speaks either to me or aunt. He did say that he was kept away to attend an important patient.”
“Yes, yes, of course. That must be it.”
Laura was silent. Aunt Grace had sown a seed in her heart which had begun to grow rapidly, in spite of her sisterly efforts to check it as a noxious weed.
“Well, why don’t you speak?” cried the visitor, sharply.
“Because I have nothing to say.”
Isabel flushed up, and Laura stared at her, wondering whether this was the placid, gentle girl whom she had known so long.
“Then why have you nothing to say?” cried Isabel, angrily. “He is your brother, and if all the world is turning against him, is it not your duty to defend—to try and find excuses for his conduct?”
“Isabel!”
“Well, I mean what I say. It is quite enough that I turn against him and that everything between us is at an end. I hate him now, for he has used me cruelly, and it seems to have changed my nature; but I cannot forget the past, and would not be malignant and cruel too.”