"No," he said. "Though, mind, I own to my shame there was a time when I
almost hoped it would fail. Mr. Sebright has put me in a better frame of
mind. I have little or nothing to dread from the success of the
operation--if, by any extraordinary chance, it should succeed. I remind
you of Mr. Sebright's opinion merely to give you a right idea of the tone
which he took with me at starting. He only consented under protest to
contemplate the event which Lucilla and Herr Grosse consider to be a
certainty. 'If the statement of your position requires it,' he said, 'I
will admit that it is barely possible she may be able to see you two
months hence. Now begin.' I began by informing him of my marriage
engagement."

"Shall I tell you how Mr. Sebright received the information?" I said. "He
held his tongue, and made you a bow."

Oscar laughed.

"Quite true!" he answered. "I told him next of Lucilla's extraordinary
antipathy to dark people, and dark shades of color of all kinds. Can you
guess what he said to me when I had done?"

I owned that my observation of Mr. Sebright's character did not extend to
guessing that.

"He said it was a common antipathy in his experience of the blind. It was
one among the many strange influences exercised by blindness on the mind.
'The physical affliction has its mysterious moral influence,' he said.
'We can observe it, but we can't explain it. The special antipathy which
you mention, is an incurable antipathy, except on one condition--the
recovery of the sight.' There he stopped. I entreated him to go on. No!
He declined to go on until I had finished what I had to say to him first.
I had my confession still to make to him--and I made it."

"You concealed nothing?"

"Nothing. I laid my weakness bare before him. I told him that Lucilla was
still firmly convinced that Nugent's was the discolored face, instead of
mine. And then I put the question--What am I to do?"

"And how did he reply?"

"In these words:--'If you ask me what you are to do, in the event of her
remaining blind (which I tell you again will be the event), I decline to
advise you. Your own conscience and your own sense of honor must decide
the question. On the other hand, if you ask me what you are to do, in the
event of her recovering her sight, I can answer you unreservedly in the
plainest terms. Leave things as they are; and wait till she sees.' Those
were his own words. Oh, the load that they took off my mind! I made him
re