een the master of the Hill and a Harrowby he
would have done so, but the master of the Hill and the head of the house
of Harrowby had a character to maintain and a social ideal to keep pure.
He could not bring into such a home as his, present to his mother as her
daughter, to his sisters as their sister, a girl who by her own
confession was a murderess--a girl who, if the law had its due, would be
hanged by the neck in the precincts of the county jail till she was
dead. He might have been sinful enough in his own life, in the ordinary
way of men--and truly there were passages in his past that would
scarcely bear the light--but what were the worst of his misdemeanors
compared with this awful crime? No: he must resolutely crush the last
lingering impulse of tenderness, and leave her to work through her own
tribulation, as he also must work through his.

"But we must part," he said for a third time.

Her lips quivered. She did not answer, only bent her head in sign of
acquiescence.

"It is hard to say it, harder still to do; and I who loved you so
dearly!" cried Edgar with the angry despair of a man forced against
himself to give up his desire.

She put up her hands. "Don't!" she said with a sharp cry. "I cannot bear
to hear about your love."

He gave a sudden sob. Her love for him was very precious to him--his for
her very strong.

"Why did you tell me?" he then said. "And yet you did the right thing to
tell me: I was wrong to say that. It was good of you, Leam--noble, like
yourself."

"I love you. That is not being noble," she answered slowly and with
infinite pathos. "I could not have deceived you after I remembered."

"You are too noble to deceive," he said, holding out his hand.

Leam turned away. "I am not fit to touch your hand," she said, the very
pride of contrition in her voice--pride for him, if humiliation for
herself.

"For this once," he pleaded.

"I am unworthy," she answered.

At this moment little Fina came jumping into the room. She had in her
hand a rose-colored scarf that had once been poor madame's, and which
the nurse, turning out an old box of hers, had found and given to the
child.

After she had kissed Edgar, played with his _breloques_, looked at the
works of his watch, plaited his beard into three strings, and done all
that she generally did in the way of welcome, she shook out the gauze
scarf over her dress.

"This was mamma's--my own mamma's," she said. "Leam will never tell