"There is a clause in your father's will that you may have forgotten, Edith," said her aunt.
"That which makes me penniless if I do not marry Edward Hamden?"
"Yes."
"No—I have not forgotten it, aunt."
"And you mean to brave that consequence?"
"In a choice of evils we always take the least." Edith's voice trembled.
Mrs. Ravensworth did not reply for some moments. While she sat silent, the half-closed door near which Edith stood, and toward which her aunt's back was turned, softly opened, and a handsome youth, between whom and Edith glances of intelligence instantly passed, presented the startled maiden with a beautiful white rose, and then noiselessly retired.
It was nearly a minute before Mrs. Ravensworth resumed the light employment in which she was engaged, and as she did so, she said—
"Many a foolish young girl gets her head turned with those gay gallants at our fashionable watering-places, and imagines that she has won a heart when the object of her vain regard never felt the throb of a truly unselfish and noble impulse."
The crimson deepened on Edith's cheeks and brow, and as she lifted her eyes, she saw herself in a large mirror opposite, with her aunt's calm eyes steadily fixed upon her. To turn her face partly away, so that it could no longer be reflected from the mirror, was the work of an instant. In a few moments she said—