quite made up my mind. I was only waiting to
see you again and tell you--next week I am going back to the convent
for ever. Oh, why did we leave it, Molly, why did we leave it!" She
broke down, and the tears gushed from her eyes.

Lady Landale had listened in silence.

"Well--is that all?" she said impatiently, when her sister ceased
speaking, while in the background Tanty groaned out a protest, and
bewailed that she was alive to see the day. "What does it matter what
you do afterwards--you can go to the convent--go where you will then;
but what has that to say to your visit to _him_ now?"

"I have done with all human love," said Madeleine solemnly, crossing
her hands on her breast, and looking upward with inspired eyes. "I did
love this man once," she answered, hardening herself to speak firmly,
though again her lips quivered--"he himself killed that love by his
own doing. I trusted him; he betrayed that trust; he would have
betrayed me, but that I have forgiven, it is past and done with. But
to go and see him now, to stir up in my heart, not the old love, it
could not be, but agitation, sorrow--to disturb this quietness of
soul, this calm which God has given me at last after so much prayer
and struggle--no, no--it would not be right, it cannot be! Moreover,
if I would, I could not, indeed I could not. The very thought of it
all, the disgrace, that place of sin and shame, of him in chains,
condemned--a criminal--a murderer!..."

A nervous shudder shook her from head to foot, she seemed in truth to
sicken and grow faint, like one forced to face some hideous nauseating
spectacle. "As for him," she went on in low, feeble tones, "it will be
the best too. God knows I forgive him, that I am sorry for him, that I
regret his terrible fate. But I feel it would be worse for him to see
me--if he must die, it would be wrong to distract him from his last
preparations. And it would only be a useless pain to him, for I could
not pretend--he would see that I despise him. I thought I loved a
noble gentleman, not one who was even then playing with crime and
cheating."

The faint passionless voice had hardly ceased before, with a loud cry,
Molly sprang at her sister as if she would have strangled her.

"Oh, unnatural wretch," she exclaimed, "you are not fit to live!"

Tanty rushed forward and dragged the infuriated woman away.

Madeleine rose up stiffly--swayed a moment as she stood--and then fell
unconscious to the ground.