me for asking you. Do you love some one else? is it that?"

She bent her head silently.

"Have you any hopes of marrying the man you love?"

"Oh no, none--not the slightest," she said, hurriedly; "I shall never
marry."

"Then, Vera, will you listen to an old woman's advice?"

"Yes, dear Lady Kynaston."

"My dear, if you cannot marry the man you love, put him out of your
mind."

"I must do that in any case," she said, wearily.

"Listen to me, my dear. Don't sacrifice your own life and the life of a
man who is good and loves you dearly to a caprice of your heart. Hush!
don't interrupt me; I dare say you don't think it a caprice; you think it
is to last for ever. But there is no 'for ever' in these matters; the
thing comes to us like an ordinary disease; some of us take it strongly,
and it half kills us; some of us are only a very little ill; but we all
get over it. There is a pain that goes right through one's heart: it is
worse to bear than any physical suffering: but, thank God, that pain
always wears itself out. My dear, I, who speak to you, have felt it, and
I tell you that no man is worth it. You can cure yourself of it if you
will; and the remedy is work and change of the conditions of your life.
You don't think I look very much like a blighted being, do you? and yet I
did not marry the man I loved. I could not; he was poor, and my parents
would not allow it. I thought I should die, but you see I did not. I took
up my life bravely, and I married a most estimable man; I lived an active
and healthy life, so that by degrees it became a happy one. Now, Vera,
why should you not do the same? Your people have a right to expect that
you should marry; they cannot afford to support you for always. Because
you are disappointed in one thing, why are you not to make the best you
can of your life?"

"I do mean to marry--in time," said Vera, brokenly, with tears in her
eyes.

"Then why not marry John?"

There was a minute's silence. Was it possible that Lady Kynaston did not
know? Vera asked herself. Was it possible that she could, in cold blood,
advise her to marry one son whilst the other one loved her! That was what
was so terrible to her mind. To marry was simple enough, but to marry Sir
John Kynaston! She thought of what such an action might bring upon them
all. The daily meetings, the struggles with temptation, the awful
tampering with deadly sin. Could any one so constituted as she was walk
deliberately and wi