he knew, and was willing to work to
support her?"

"Yes, certainly, she was under obligation for all his kindness, but his
being in love with her--that is different."

But Alec Trenholme, like many people, could not see a fine point in the
heat of discussion. Afterwards, on reflection he saw what she had meant,
but now he only acted in the most unreasonable of ways.

"Well, I don't see it as you do," he said; and then, the picture of
suppressed indignation, he took up the pail to go inside and dispose of
it.

"I don't know how it can all be," said Sophia considering, "but I'm sure
there's a great deal of good in her."

At this, further silence, even out of deference to her, seemed to him
inadequate. "I don't pretend to know how it can be; how she got here, or
what she has been doing here, dressed in silk finery, or what she may
have been masquerading with matches in the old house over there for. All
I know is, a girl who treated Bates as she did--"

"No, you don't know any of these things. You have only heard one side
of the story. It is not fair to judge."

"She has ruined his life, done as good as killed him. Why should you
take her part?"

"Because there are always two sides to everything. I don't know much of
her story, but I have heard some of it, and it didn't sound like what
you have said. As to her being in the Harmon house--" Sophia stopped.

"Do you mean to say," asked Alec, "that she has been living here all the
time quite openly?"

"Yes--that is, she has given a false name, it seems, but, Mr.
Trenholme--"

"If she has lied about her name, depend upon it she has lied about
everything else. I wouldn't want you to go within ten feet of her."

Although the fallacy of such argument as Alec's too often remains
undetected when no stubborn fact arises to support justice, Sophia, with
her knowledge of Eliza, could not fail to see the absurdity of it. Her
mind was dismayed at the thought of what the girl had apparently done
and concealed, but nothing could make her doubt that the Eliza she knew
was different from the Sissy Cameron he was depicting. She did not
doubt, either, that if anything would bring out all the worst in her and
make her a thousand times more unkind to Bates, it would be the attack
Alec Trenholme meditated. She decided that she ought herself to act as
go-between. She remembered the scorn with which the patronage of a
vulgar woman had that evening been discarded, and whether Eliza her