“Trouble?” Molly stammered.
“I should have said bereavement,” said Madelon Trueheart, tears softening the glitter of her cold, dark eyes, and Molly exclaimed, tenderly:
“Forgive me, I have heard nothing.”
“Then I must tell you, for I do not like for you to think that my parents are selfish, and that I am cruel to the man I love.”
“Forgive me for interfering. I did not know there was anything serious behind your refusal to marry.”
“Listen,” said Madelon, gently, “I am not angry with you for interfering. You did not know what others do. Dear Mrs. Laurens, my parents had two children once, a son and daughter. Their son, my senior by several years, died in the prime of youth, and it almost broke their hearts.”
“Died in his youth—oh, how sad!”
Tears that had been gathering on Molly’s lashes rolled down her cheeks.
“That was not the saddest part of it,” said Madelon Trueheart. “My dear, he was dead to us long before the coffin lid covered his handsome face from the sight of men. He offended my father and was disinherited and driven from home because he contracted a mésalliance.”
“A mésalliance,” Molly faltered, with a half sob that this time was for herself, not Madelon Trueheart’s dead brother.