party to the deceit? Not sufficiently
acquainted with the world to understand how strong had been the
temptation to play the part they did, if they wished to give Ruth a
chance, Jemima could not believe them guilty of such deceit as the
knowledge of Mrs Denbigh's previous conduct would imply; and yet how
it darkened the latter into a treacherous hypocrite, with a black
secret shut up in her soul for years--living in apparent confidence,
and daily household familiarity with the Bensons for years, yet never
telling the remorse that ought to be corroding her heart! Who was
true? Who was not? Who was good and pure? Who was not? The very
foundations of Jemima's belief in her mind were shaken.

Could it be false? Could there be two Ruth Hiltons? She went over
every morsel of evidence. It could not be. She knew that Mrs
Denbigh's former name had been Hilton. She had heard her speak
casually, but charily, of having lived in Fordham. She knew she had
been in Wales but a short time before she made her appearance in
Eccleston. There was no doubt of the identity. Into the middle of
Jemima's pain and horror at the afternoon's discovery, there came a
sense of the power which the knowledge of this secret gave her over
Ruth; but this was no relief, only an aggravation of the regret with
which Jemima looked back on her state of ignorance. It was no wonder
that when she arrived at home, she was so oppressed with headache
that she had to go to bed directly.

"Quiet, mother! quiet, dear, dear mother" (for she clung to the known
and tried goodness of her mother more than ever now), "that is all
I want." And she was left to the stillness of her darkened room,
the blinds idly flapping to and fro in the soft evening breeze, and
letting in the rustling sound of the branches which waved close to
her window, and the thrush's gurgling warble, and the distant hum of
the busy town.

Her jealousy was gone--she knew not how or where. She might shun and
recoil from Ruth, but she now thought that she could never more be
jealous of her. In her pride of innocence, she felt almost ashamed
that such a feeling could have had existence. Could Mr Farquhar
hesitate between her own self and one who-- No! she could not name
what Ruth had been, even in thought. And yet he might never know,
so fair a seeming did her rival wear. Oh! for one ray of God's
holy light to know what was seeming, and what was truth, in this
traitorous hollow earth! It might be--she use