Her voice quivered with repressed agony, and there was a note of despairing appeal in her tones that smote her listener keenly.
"But would it be quite honest not to tell Clifford? My name is really Dorothy Hungerford, you know," she gravely responded.
"The decree gave me the right to resume my maiden name, or to retain his—whichever I chose. If I preferred to keep the latter portion of his, I cannot think there would be any dishonesty in your being married as Dorothy Ford," Helen argued, but not feeling quite comfortable or honest in the position she had assumed.
"All the same, there would be a deceptive thought back of it—something to conceal from my husband, which might some time cloud our lives if it should be discovered later," Dorothy persisted, a troubled look in her eyes.
Helen groaned bitterly in spirit. She knew that the girl's attitude was the only safe one to adopt, but she shrank from the ordeal with a sickening dread.
"Have you no fear that this confession may cloud your life even before your hopes are realized?" she questioned, almost sharply, in her despair.
"Mamma, surely you do not fear that!" Dorothy cried, aghast, her face blanching suddenly snow white.
"The Alexanders are very proud," sighed her mother.
"Oh, I never thought of anything so dreadful!" said the girl unsteadily. "I have such faith in Clifford's love for me. The only reason I have hesitated was because I could not bear to wound you by recalling our trouble, by having to tell any one what you have had to bear. But now"—with a sudden dauntless uplifting of her head—"I must tell him immediately. If there is the least danger that this disclosure will change his regard for, or his intentions toward, me, or will make trouble between him and his people, it is better to know and meet it now than when it would be too late to remedy the mistake."
"But could you bear it, Dorrie?" almost sobbed Helen. "Think, dear, what the worst would mean to you."