"Wouldn't you marry Mr. Glyn, leave the stage, and be comfortable in some small house at Hampstead?"
"No," she said, frankly; "I haven't got the domestic faculty. I should worry his life out in a few months."
"What do you say, then, to going with me to America? I mean to leave England for a long time—for some years—and I shall spend most of the time in America, visiting the places my mother and I used to know."
"You are going to leave England?" said Nelly, looking up with earnest, curious eyes.
"Yes."
"You will forgive my saying it—you have had some peculiar secret from me for a long time—not your coming here, but something quite different. I knew that when you suddenly left the stage, and wouldn't return, for no reason whatever. Why should you have left the stage, of all people?"
"I left it simply because I got to dislike it—to hate it!"
Nelly Featherstone said nothing, but she was evidently not satisfied with the answer. She remained unusually thoughtful for some time.
"And now you are going to America," she said. "Is there no other reason besides your wish to visit those places you speak of?"
"There is; but it is of no consequence to any one."