For some moments Christabel was dumb. It was one thing to have come into this young lioness's den, and another thing to know what to say to the lioness. But the straightness and purity of the girl's purpose upheld her—and her courage hardly faltered.
"I have come to you, Miss Mayne, because I will not consent to be governed by common report. I want to know the truth—the whole truth—however bitter it may be for me—in order that I may know how to act."
Miss Mayne had expected a much sharper mode of attack. She had been prepared to hear herself called scorpion—or viper—the pest of society—a form of address to which she would have been able to reply with a startling sharpness. But to be spoken to thus—gravely, gently, pleadingly, and with that sweet girlish face looking at her in unspeakable sorrow—was something for which she had not prepared herself.
"You speak to me like a lady—like a good woman," she said, falteringly. "What is it you want to know?"
"I have been told that Mr. Hamleigh—Angus Hamleigh—was once your lover. Is that true?"
"True as the stars in heaven—the stars by which we swore to love each other to the end of our lives—looking up at them, with our hands clasped, as we stood on the deck of the steamer between Dover and Calais. That was our marriage. I used to think that God saw it, and accepted it—just as if we had been in church: only it did not hold water, you see," she added, with a cynical laugh, which ended in a hard little cough.
"He loved you dearly. I can see that by the lines that he wrote in your books. I ventured to look at them while I waited for you. Why did he not marry you?"
Stella Mayne shrugged her shoulders, and played with the soft lace of her fichu.
"It is not the fashion to marry a girl who dances in short petticoats, and lives in an attic," she answered. "Perhaps such a girl might make a good wife, if a man had the courage to try the experiment. Such things have been done, I believe; but most men prefer the safer course. If I had been clever, I daresay Mr. Hamleigh would have married me; but I was an ignorant little fool—and when he came across my path he seemed to me like an angel of light. I simply worshipped him. You've no idea how innocent I was in those days. Not a carefully educated, lady-like innocence, like yours, don't you know, but absolute ignorance. I didn't know any wrong; but then I didn't know any right. You see I am quite candid with you."
"I thank you with all my heart for your truthfulness. Everything—for you, for me, for Angus—depends upon our perfect truthfulness. I want to do what is best—what is wisest—what is right—not for myself only, but for Angus, for you."