“Tom, wait,” she said breathlessly. “You don’t understand me yet. Has it never struck you as strange that I should have asked Rhoda to live here, that I should have treated her as a child of my own?”
No, Tom was not able to say that he had thought it strange. Rhoda being Rhoda, it had seemed to him most natural that his aunt should have loved her at first sight, just as he had done. But his voice was anxious as he answered, “Aunt Lucy, I don’t understand in the least what you are driving at. What is it you want to tell me?”
She turned towards him, clasping her hands together. “Tom, Rhoda is Lydia’s little girl. She is my own niece. I have known it ever since the first day she came to see me.”
He stared at her, not comprehending. “How can she be Cousin Lydia’s child?” he asked. “She would have known you were her aunt.”
“She does not. She knows nothing. But, Tom, she is Lydia’s daughter. I know it. I have known it all these weeks.”
“But why”—he began, and then stopped, a dark flush rising in his face. He knew why his aunt had been silent.
“Tom, at first I tried to persuade myself I was mistaken,” she faltered. “And then, when I saw”—
He made a quick gesture that was full of pain. The flush in his face had faded, leaving it very white. “Aunt Lucy, do not speak of that,” he said, turning his face aside.
{Illustration: HE STARED AT HER, NOT COMPREHENDING.}
She drew closer to him, putting her hand on his arm. “Tom, what do you mean?”