ttle time, that seemed long to me, for I was truly interested in her
reply.

"I think," she said at last, "that women who have had anything like my
experience, are unfitted for married life. Either they are ruined
morally and mentally, by the terrible pressure; or they become so
sharp-sighted and critical that no ordinary man would be able to win
their confidence. I believe in marriage; a single life has an
incomplete, one-sided aspect, and is certainly lonely." Then rallying,
with much of her usual brightness: "Undoubtedly I have had my times of
doubt, when I found it hard to understand myself; and still, here I am!
Nobody would have me; or I would not have anybody; or both."

"One more question, then, if it is a fair one: Could you love again the
husband of your youth; or has your ideal changed?"

Mrs. Greyfield was evidently disturbed by the inquiry. Her countenance
altered, and she hesitated to reply.

"I beg your pardon," I said; "I hope you will not answer me, if I have
been impertinent."

"That is a question I never asked myself," she finally replied. "My
husband was all in all to me during our brief married life. His death
left me truly desolate, and his memory sacred. But we were both young,
and probably he may have been unformed in character, to a great degree,
as well as myself. How he would seem now, if he could be restored to me
as he was then, I can only half imagine. What he would now _be_, if he
had lived on, I cannot at all imagine. But let us now go take a wink of
sleep. My eyelids at last begin to feel dry and heavy; and you, I am
sure, are perishing under the tortures of resistance to the drowsy god."

"The storm is over," I said. "I thought you felt that something was
going to happen!"

"It will be breakfast, I suppose. By the way, I must go and put a note
under Jane's door, telling her not to have it before half-past nine.
There will be a letter from Benton, by the morning mail. Good night; or,
good morning, and sweet slumber."

"God be with you," I responded, and in twenty minutes was sleeping
soundly.

Not so my hostess, it seems, for when we met again at our ten o'clock
breakfast, she looked pale and distraught, and acknowledged that she had
not been able to compose herself after our long talk. The morning was
clear and sunny, but owing to the storm of the night, the mail was late
getting in, a circumstance which gave her, as I thought, a degree of
uneasiness not warranted by so natur