"From me! how could she? I know every detail of their affairs."
"No matter. I listened to what she said that day in the cottage when I had the boy on my knee. I noticed her face, and I am quite certain. She has a secret, and above all a secret from you."
Marcella looked disturbed for a moment, then she laughed.
"Oh, no!" she said, with a little superior air. "I assure you I know her better than you."
Wharton said no more.
"Marcella!" called a distant voice from the hall.
The girl gathered up her white skirts and her flowers in haste.
"Good-night!"
"Good-night! I shall hear you come home and wonder how you have sped. One word, if I may! Take your rôle and play it. There is nothing subjects dislike so much as to see royalty decline its part."
She laughed, blushed, a little proudly and uncertainly, and went without reply. As she shut the door behind her, a sudden flatness fell upon her. She walked through the dark Stone Parlour outside, seeing still the firmly-knit lightly-made figure—boyish, middle-sized, yet never insignificant—the tumbled waves of fair hair, the eyes so keenly blue, the face with its sharp mocking lines, its powers of sudden charm. Then self-reproach leapt, and possessed her. She quickened her pace, hurrying into the hall, as though from something she was ashamed or afraid of.