xpostulated, but in vain.

"It will be better so, dear," Mrs. Orme had said. "It will teach the
servants and people to think that he still respects and esteems you."

"But he does not!" said she, speaking almost sharply. "How would it
be possible? Ah, me--respect and esteem are gone from me for ever!"

"No, not for ever," replied Mrs. Orme. "You have much to bear, but no
evil lasts for ever."

"Will not sin last for ever;--sin such as mine?"

"Not if you repent;--repent and make such restitution as is possible.
Lady Mason, say that you have repented. Tell me that you have asked
Him to pardon you!" And then, as had been so often the case during
these last days, Lady Mason sat silent, with hard, fixed eyes, with
her hands clasped, and her lips compressed. Never as yet had Mrs.
Orme induced her to say that she had asked for pardon at the cost of
telling her son that the property which he called his own had been
procured for him by his mother's fraud. That punishment, and that
only, was too heavy for her neck to bear. Her acquittal in the law
court would be as nothing to her if it must be followed by an avowal
of her guilt to her own son!

Sir Peregrine did come up stairs and handed her down through the hall
as he had proposed. When he came into the room she did not look at
him, but stood leaning against the table, with her eyes fixed upon
the ground.

"I hope you find yourself better," he said, as he put out his hand to
her. She did not even attempt to make a reply, but allowed him just
to touch her fingers.

"Perhaps I had better not come down," said Mrs. Orme. "It will be
easier to say good-bye here."

"Good-bye," said Lady Mason, and her voice sounded in Sir Peregrine's
ears like a voice from the dead.

"God bless you and preserve you," said Mrs. Orme, "and restore you to
your son. God will bless you if you will ask Him. No; you shall not
go without a kiss." And she put out her arms that Lady Mason might
come to her.

The poor broken wretch stood for a moment as though trying to
determine what she would do; and then, almost with a shriek, she
threw herself on to the bosom of the other woman, and burst into a
flood of tears. She had intended to abstain from that embrace; she
had resolved that she would do so, declaring to herself that she was
not fit to be held against that pure heart; but the tenderness of the
offer had overcome her; and now she pressed her friend convulsively
in her arms, as though there