you took me.
That would be too hard to bear."

They were both standing now.

"You are talking nonsense, child," he said, tenderly, as he took her
hand. "You know I love you truly. Surely my pictures must have told you
that. Honestly now, did you not feel that it was so?"

"I did not know you loved me then, Cuthbert. There were other things,
you know, that made me feel it could not be so, but then that for the
first time I really knew----" and she stopped.

"That you loved me, darling?" and he drew her closer to him. "Now, you
gave me a straightforward answer before--I insist on as straightforward
a one now."

And this time the answer was not, No.

"Mind," he said a few minutes afterwards, "your vocation is definitely
fixed at last, Mary, and there must be no more changing."

"As if you did not know there won't be," she said, saucily. And then
suddenly altering her tone she went on, "Now, Cuthbert, you will surely
tell me what you would not before. What did you find out? It is
something about my father, I am sure."

"Let me think before I answer you," he said, and then sat silent for two
or three minutes. "Well," he said, at last, "I think you have a right to
know. You may be sure that in any case I should before, for your sake,
have done everything in my power towards arranging things amicably with
him. Now, of course, that feeling is vastly stronger, and for my own
sake as well as yours I should abstain from any action against him.
Mind, at present I have only vague suspicions, but if those suspicions
turn out true, it will be evident that your father has been pursuing a
very tortuous policy, to put it no stronger, in order to gain possession
of Fairclose. I cannot say definitely as yet what I shall do, but at
present I incline to the opinion that I shall drop the matter
altogether."

"Not for my sake, Cuthbert," she said, firmly. "I have always felt
uneasy about it. I can scarcely say why, but I am afraid it is so. Of
course I know my father better than people in general do. I have known
that he was not what he seemed to be. It has always been my sorest
trouble, that we have never got on well together. He has never liked me,
and I have not been able to respect him. I know that if he has done
anything absolutely wrong--it seems terrible that I should even think
such a thing possible--but if it has been so--I know you will not expose
him."

"We will not talk any more about it, dear," Cuthbert interrupted; "