life had been more or less
veiled to her and softened by falling on older and friendly shoulders.
She now got for the first time a clear view of Carrington, apart from
the quiet exterior in which the man was hidden. She felt quite sure, by
a sudden flash of feminine inspiration, that the curious look of patient
endurance on his face was the work of a single night when he had held
his brother in his arms, and knew that the blood was draining drop by
drop from his side, in the dense, tangled woods, beyond the reach of
help, hour after hour, till the voice failed and the limbs grew stiff
and cold. When he had finished his story, she was afraid to speak. She
did not know how to show her sympathy, and she could not bear to seem
unsympathetic. In her embarrassment she fairly broke down and could only
dry her eyes in silence.

Having once got this weight of confidence off his mind, Carrington felt
comparatively gay and was ready to make the best of things. He laughed
at himself to drive away the tears of his pretty companion, and obliged
her to take a solemn pledge never to betray him. "Of course your sister
knows it all," he said; "but she must never know that I told you, and I
never would tell any one but you."

Sybil promised faithfully to keep his confidence to herself, and she
went on to defend her sister.

"You must not blame Madeleine," said she; "if you knew as well as I do
what she has been through, you would not think her cold. You do know how
suddenly her husband died, after only one day's illness, and what a nice
fellow he was. She was very fond of him, and his death seemed to stun
her. We hardly knew what to make of it, she was so quiet and natural.
Then just a week later her little child died of diphtheria, suffering
horribly, and she wild with despair because she could not relieve it.
After that, she was almost insane; indeed, I have always thought she was
quite insane for a time. I know she was excessively violent and wanted
to kill herself, and I never heard any one rave as she did about
religion and resignation and God. After a few weeks she became quiet and
stupid and went about like a machine; and at last she got over it, but
has never been what she was before. You know she was a rather fast
New York girl before she married, and cared no more about politics and
philanthropy than I do. It was a very late thing, all this stuff.
But she is not really hard, though she may seem so. It is all on the
surface. I