Kitabı oku: «The Letter of Credit», sayfa 18

The morning's work was a good one for Rotha. She made up her mind. That, indeed, she had done before; now she took her stand with a clearer knowledge of the ground and of the way in which the difficulties were to be met. By a new heart, nothing less; a heart of flesh; which indeed she could not create, but which she could ask for and hope for; and in the mean time she must "cast away from her all her transgressions." No compromise, and no delay. As to this anger at her aunt, – well, it was there, and she could not put it out; but allow it and agree to it, or give it expression, that she would not do.

She cast about her then for things to be done, neglected duties. No studies neglected were on her conscience; there did occur to her some large holes in the heels of her stockings. Rotha did not like mending; however, here was duty. She got out the stockings and examined them. A long job, and to her a hateful one, for the stockings had been neglected. Rotha had but a little yarn to mend with; she sat down to the work and kept at it until she had used up her last thread. That finished the morning, for the stockings were fine, and the same feeling of duty which made her take up the mending made her do it conscientiously.

The evening was spent happily over the stereoscope and Fergusson on Architecture. Towards the end of it Mrs. Mowbray whispered to her,

"My dear, your aunt wishes you to spend a day with her; don't you think it would be a good plan to go to-morrow? A thing is always more graceful when it is done without much delay."

Rotha could but acquiesce.

"And make the best of it," Mrs. Mowbray went on kindly; "and make the best of them. There is a best side to everybody; it is good to try and get at it. The Bible says 'Overcome evil with good.'"

"Can one, always?" said Rotha.

"I think one can always – if one has the chance and time. At any rate, it is good to try."

"But don't you think, ma'am, one must feel pleasant, before one can act pleasant?"

"Feel pleasant, then," said Mrs. Mowbray smiling. "Can't you?"

"You do not know how difficult it is," said Rotha.

"Perhaps I do. Hearts are alike."

"O no, Mrs. Mowbray!" said Rotha in sudden protest.

"Not in everything. But fallen nature is fallen nature, my dear; one person's temptations may be different from another's, but in the longing to do our own pleasure and have our own way, we are all pretty much alike. None of us has anything to boast of. What you despise, is the yielding to a temptation which does not attack you."

Rotha's look at her friend was intelligent and candid. She said nothing.

"And if you can meet hatred with love, it is ten to one you can overcome it. Wouldn't that be a victory worth trying for?"

Rotha knew the victory over herself was the first one to be gained. But she silently acquiesced; and after breakfast next morning, with reluctant steps, she set forth to go to her aunt's in Twenty-third Street. She had been in a little doubt how to dress herself. Should she wear her old things? or subject the new ones to her aunt's criticism? But Antoinette had seen the pretty plaid school dress; it would be foolish to make any mystery of it. She dressed herself as usual.

Mrs. Busby and her daughter were in the sitting room up stairs. Rotha had knocked, modestly, and as she went in they both lifted up their heads and looked at her, with a long look of survey. Rotha had come quite up to them before her aunt spoke.

"Well, Rotha, – so it is you?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Have you come to see me at last?"

"Yes, ma'am. Mrs. Mowbray said you wished it."

"What made you choose to-day particularly?"

"Nothing. Mrs. Mowbray said – "

"Well, go on. What did Mrs. Mowbray say?"

"She said you wanted to have me come, some day, and she thought I had better do it to-day."

"Yes. Did she give no reason?"

"No. At least – "

"At least what?"

Rotha had no skill whatever in prevarication, nor understood the art.

Nothing occurred to her but to tell the truth.

"Mrs. Mowbray said a thing was more graceful that was done promptly."

The slightest possible change in the set of Mrs. Busby's lips, the least perceptible air of her head, expressed what another woman might have told by a snort of disdain. Mrs. Busby's manner was quite as striking, Rotha thought. Her own anger was rising fast.

"O, and I suppose she is teaching you to do things gracefully?" said Antoinette. "Mamma, the idea!"

"It did not occur to her or you that I might like to see my niece occasionally?" said Mrs. Busby.

Rotha bit her lips and succeeded in biting down the answer.

"We have not grown very graceful yet," Antoinette went on. "It is usually thought civilized to answer people."

"You had better take off your things," Mrs. Busby said. "You may lay them up stairs in your room."

"Is there any reason which makes this an inconvenient day for me to be here?" Rotha asked before moving to obey this command.

"It makes no difference. The proper time for putting such a question, if you want to do things gracefully, is before taking your action, while the answer can also be given gracefully, if unfavourable."

Rotha went slowly up stairs, feeling that or any other place in the house better than the room where her aunt was. She went to her little cold, cheerless, desolate-looking, old room. How she had suffered there! how thankful she was to be in it no more! how changed were her circumstances! Could she not be good and keep the peace, this one day? She had purposed to be very good, and calm, like Mr. Digby; and now already she felt as if a bunch of nettles had been drawn all over her. What an unmanageable thing was this temper of hers. She went down stairs slowly and lingeringly. The two looked at her again as she entered the room; now that her cloak was off, the new dress came into view.

"Where did you get that dress, Rotha?" was her aunt's question.

"Mrs. Mowbray got it for me."

"Does she propose to send me the bill by and by?"

"Of course not! Aunt Serena, Mrs. Mowbray never does mean things."

"H'm! What induced her then to go to such expense for a girl she never saw before?"

"I suppose she was sorry for me," said Rotha, with her heart swelling.

"Sorry for you! May I ask, why?"

"You know how I was dressed, aunt Serena; and you know how the other girls in school dress."

"I know a great many of them have foolish mothers, who make themselves ridiculous by the way they let their children appear. It is a training of vanity. I should not have thought Mrs. Mowbray would lend herself to such nonsense."

"But you do not think Antoinette has a foolish mother?" Rotha could not help saying. Mrs. Busby's daughter was quite as much dressed as the other girls. That she ought not to have made that speech, Rotha knew; but she made it. So much satisfaction she must have. It remained however completely ignored.

"Who made your dress?" Mrs. Busby went on.

"A dress-maker. One of the ladies went with me to have it cut."

"What did you do Christmas?" Antoinette inquired. In reply to which, Rotha gave an account of her visit to the Old Coloured Home.

"Just like Mrs. Mowbray!" was Mrs. Busby's comment. "She has no discretion."

"Why do you say that, aunt Serena?"

"Such an expenditure of money for nothing. What good would a little tea and a little tobacco do those people? It would not last more than a week or two; and then they are just where they were before."

"But it did not cost so very much," objected Rotha.

"Have you reckoned it up? Fifty or sixty half-pounds of tea, fifty or sixty pounds of sugar, – why, the sugar alone would be five or six dollars; and the tobacco, and the carriage hire; and I don't know what beside. All for nothing. That woman does not know what to do with money."

"But is it not something, to make so many poor people happy, if even only for a little while?"

"It would be a great deal better to give them something to do them good; a flannel petticoat, now, or a pair of warm socks. That would last. Or putting the money in the funds of the Institution, where it would go to their daily needs. I always think of that."

"Would it go to their daily needs? Some ladies got a cow for them once; and it just gave the matron cream for her tea, and they got no good of it."

"I don't believe that at all!" exclaimed Mrs. Busby. "I know the matron; Mrs. Bothers; I know her, for I recommended her myself. I have no idea she would be guilty of any such impropriety. It is just the gossip in the house, that Mrs. Mowbray has taken up in her haste and swallowed."

Rotha tried to hold her tongue. It was hard.

"Did Mrs. Mowbray give you anything Christmas?" Antoinette asked, pushing her inquiries. Rotha hesitated, but could find no way to answer without admitting the affirmative.

"What?" was the immediate next question; and even Mrs. Busby looked with ill-pleased eyes to hear Rotha's next words. It seemed like making her precious things common, to tell of them to these unkind ears. Yet there was no help for it.

"She gave me a travelling hand-bag."

"What sort?"

"Russia leather."

"There, mamma!" Antoinette exclaimed. "Isn't that Mrs. Mowbray all over?

When a morocco one, or a canvas one, would have done just as well."

"As I said," returned Mrs. Busby. "Mrs. Mowbray does not know what to do with money. When are you going travelling, Rotha?"

"I do not know. Some time in my life, I suppose."

"What a ridiculous thing to give her!" pursued Antoinette.

"Yes, I think so," her mother echoed. "Do not let yourself be deluded, Rotha, by presents of travelling bags or anything else. Your future life is not likely to be spent in pleasuring. What I can do for you in the way of giving you an education, will be all I can do; then you will have to make a living and a home for, yourself; and the easiest way you can do it will be by teaching. I shall tell Mrs. Mowbray to educate you for some post in which perhaps she can put you by and by; she or somebody else. So pack up your expectations; you will not need to do much of other sorts of packing."

"You forget there is another person to be consulted, aunt Serena."

"What other person?" said Mrs. Busby raising her head and fixing her observant eyes upon Rotha.

"Mr. Southwode."

"Mr. Southwode!" repeated the lady coldly. "I am ignorant what a stranger like him has to say about our family affairs."

"He is not a stranger," said Rotha hotly. "He is the person I know best in the world, and love best. He is the person to whom I belong; that mother left me to; and it is for him, not for you, to say what I shall do, or what I shall be."

Imprudent Rotha! But passion is always imprudent.

"Very improper language!" said Mrs. Busby coldly. "When a young lady speaks so of a young gentleman, what are we to think?"

"I am not a young lady," said Rotha; "and he is not a young gentleman; at least, not very young; and you may think the truth, which is what I say."

"Do you mean that you have arranged to marry Mr. Southwode?" said the lady, fixing her keen little eyes upon Rotha's face.

Rotha's face flamed, with mingled indignation and shame; she deigned no answer.

"She doesn't speak, mamma," said Antoinette mischievously. "You may depend, that's the plan. Rotha and Mr. Southwode! I declare, that's too good! So that's the arrangement!"

"I am so ashamed that I cannot speak to you," said Rotha in her passion and humiliation. "How can you say such wicked things! I wish Mr. Southwode was here to give you a proper answer."

"What, you think he would take your part?" said her aunt.

"He always did. He would now. He will yet, aunt Serena."

"That is enough!" said Mrs. Busby, becoming excited a little on her part. "Hush, Antoinette; I will have no more of this very unedifying conversation. But you, Rotha, may as well know that you will never see Mr. Southwode again. He is engaged in England with the affairs of his father's business; he will probably soon marry; and then there is no chance whatever that he will ever return to America. So you had best consider whether it is worth while to offend the friends you have left, for the sake of one who is nothing to you any more."

"I know Mr. Southwode better than that," was Rotha's answer. But the girl's face was purple with honest shame.

"You expect he will come back and make you his wife?" said Mrs. Busby scornfully.

"I expect he will come back and take care of me. You might as well talk of his making that pussy cat his wife. I am just a poor girl, and no more. But he will take care of me. I know he will, if I have to wait ten years first."

"How old are you now?"

"Sixteen, almost."

"Then in ten years you will be twenty six. My dear, there is only one way in which Mr. Southwode could take care of you then; he must make you his wife, or leave it to somebody else to take care of you. He knows that as well as I do; and so he put you in my hands. Now let us make an end of this disgraceful scene. Before ten years are past, you will probably be the wife of somebody else. All this talk is very foolish."

Rotha thought it was, but also thought the fault was not in her part of it. She sat glowing with confusion; she felt as if the blood would verily start through her skin; and angry in proportion. Still she was silent, though Antoinette laughed.

"What a farce, mamma! To think of Rotha being in love with Mr.

Southwode!"

"Hold your tongue, Nettie."

"To love, and to be in love, are two things," said Rotha hotly. "I do not know what being in love means; I do know the other."

"O mamma! – she doesn't know what it means!"

"I told you to be quiet, Antoinette."

"I didn't hear it, mamma. But I think you might reprove Rotha for saying what is not true."

"That is what I never do," said Rotha.

Mrs. Busby here interfered, and ordered Rotha to go up stairs to her room and stay there till she could command herself. Rotha went.

"Mamma," said Antoinette then, "I do believe it is earnest about her and Mr. Southwode. In her mind, I mean. Did you see how she coloured?"

"I should not be at all surprised," said, Mrs. Busby.

"When is he coming back, mamma?"

"I cannot say. I think he does not know himself. He writes that he is very busy at present."

"But he will come back, you think?"

"He says so. Antoinette, say nothing – not a word more – about him to Rotha. She has got her head turned, and it is best she should hear nothing whatever about him. I shall take good care that she never sees him again."

"Mamma, he don't care for her?"

"Of course not. He is too much a man of the world."

There was silence.

"Mamma," Antoinette began after a pause, "do you think Rotha is handsome?"

"She is very well," said Mrs. Busby in an indifferent tone.

"They think at school, that is, the teachers do, that she is a beauty."

"I dare say they have told her so."

"And you see how Mrs. Mowbray has dressed her up."

"I would not have sent her there, if I had known how it would be.

However, I could not arrange for her so cheaply anywhere else."

"What would you do, mamma, if Mr. Southwode were coming back?"

"I should know, in that case. He will not come yet a while. Now Antoinette, let this subject alone."

"Yes, mamma. You are a clever woman. I don't believe even Mr. Southwode could manage you."

"I can manage Mr. Southwode!" said Mrs. Busby contentedly.

CHAPTER XIX.
A NEW DEPARTURE

Rotha found her room too cold to stay in, after the first heat of her wrath had passed off. The only warm place that she knew of, beside her aunt's dressing room, was the parlour; and after a little hesitation and shivering, she softly crept down the stairs. The warm, luxurious place was empty, of people, that is; and before the glowing grate Rotha sat down on the rug and looked at the situation. Or she looked at that and the room together; the latter made her incensed. It was so full of luxury. The soft plush carpet, the thick rug on which she was crouching; how they glowed warm and rich in the red shine of the fiery grate; how beautiful the crimson ground was, and how dainty the drab tints of the flowers running over it. How stately the curtains fell to the floor with their bands of drab and crimson; and the long mirror between them, redoubling all the riches reflected in it. What a magnificent extension table, really belonging in the dining room, but doing duty now as a large centre table, only it was shoved up in one corner; and upon it the gas fixture stood, with its green glass shaft and its cut glass shade full of bunches of grapes. Nothing else was on the table; not a book; not a trinket; and so all the rest of the room was bare of everything butfurniture. The furniture was elegant; but the chairs stood round the sides of the room with pitiless regularity and seemed waiting for somebody that would never come. Empty riches! nothing else. At Mrs. Mowbray's Rotha was in another world, socially and humanly. Books swarmed from the shelves and lay on every table; pictures hung on the walls and stood on the mantelpieces; here and there some lovely statuette delighted the eye by its beauty or the mind by its associations; flowers were sure to be in a glass or a dish somewhere; and all over there were traces of travel and of cultivation, in bits of marble, or bits of bronze, or photographs, or relics, telling of various ages and countries and nationalities. Here, in Mrs. Busby's handsome rooms, the pretty hanging lamps were exceedingly new, and they were the only bronze to be seen. Rotha studied it all and made these comparisons for a while, in a vague, purposeless reverie, while she was getting warm; but then her thoughts began to come to a point. Everything and everybody in this house was utterly unsympathetic to her; animate or inanimate; was this her home? In no sense of the word. Had not her aunt just informed her, in effect, that she had no home; that if she lived to grow up she must make her own way and earn her own bread, or have none. Antoinette would grow up to all this luxury, and in all this luxury; while she would be penniless, and homeless. Had she brought this upon herself? Well, she might have been more conciliating; but in her heart of hearts Rotha did not wish she had been other than she had been. A home or friends to be gained only by subserviency and truckling, she did not covet. There came a little whisper of conscience here, suggesting that a medium existed between truckling and defiance; that it was a supposable case that one might be so pure and fair in life and spirit, that the involuntary liking and respect of friends and acquaintances would follow of necessity. Was not Mr. Digby such a person? did not Mrs. Mowbray win good-will wherever she appeared? and Rotha was just enough to acknowledge to herself that her own demeanour had been nothing less than love-winning. Alas, how could she help it, unless she were indeed made over new; a different creature. How else could she bear what must be borne in this house? But in this house she was an outcast; they would have nothing to do with her more than to see her through her schooling; there was no shelter or refuge here to which she could ever look. Nor did she care for it, if only Mr. Digby would come again. Was he lost to her? Had he really forgotten her? would he forget his promise? Rotha did not believe it; her faith in him was steadfast; but she did conceive it possible that business and circumstances might keep him where his promise would be rendered of little avail; and her heart was wrung with distress at the thought of this possibility. Distress, which but for Mrs. Mowbray would have been desolation. Even as it was, Rotha felt very desolate, very blank; and she remembered again what Mr. Digby had said, about a time that might come when all other help would fail her and she would be driven to seek God. All help had not failed yet; Mrs. Mowbray was a blessed good friend; but she was all, and Rotha had no claim upon her. I will not wait to bedriven, she thought; I will not wait to be driven by extremity; things are bad enough as it is; I will seek God now. – I have been seeking him. – Mr. Digby said I must keep on seeking, until I found. I will. But in the mean time I choose. I choose I will be a Christian, and that means, a servant of Jesus. I will be his servant, no matter what he bids me do. From this time on, I will be his servant. And then, some time, he will keep his word and take the stony heart out of me, and give me a new heart; a heart of flesh, I wonder how I came to be so hard! —

It was a step in advance of all Rotha had made yet. It was the step, which introduces a sinner into the pathway of a Christian; before which that path is not entered, however much it may be looked at and thought desirable. Rotha had made her choice and given her allegiance; for she at once told it to the Lord and asked his blessing.

And then, forthwith, came the trial of her sincerity. The cross was presented to her; which the Lord says those must take up and bear daily who would follow him. People think that crosses start up in every path; it is a mistake; they are only found in the way of following Christ and in consequence of such following. They are things that may be taken up and carried along; that must be, if the Christian follows his Master; but that he may escape if he will turn aside from following him and go with the world. They are of many kinds, but all furnished by the world and Satan without, or by self-will within. The form which the cross took on this occasion for Rotha was of the latter kind. Conscience whispered a reminder – "If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee – " And instantly Rotha's whole soul rose up in protest. Make an apology to her aunt now? Humble herself to confess herself wrong, when the wrong done to her was so manyfold greater? Bend to the hardness that would crush her? Justify another's evil by confessing her own? Self-will gave her an indignant "Impossible!" And conscience with quiet persistence held forth the cross. Rotha put both hands to her face and swayed up and down, with a kind of bodily struggle, which symbolized that going on in her mind. It was hard, it was hard! Nature cried out, with a repulsion that seemed unconquerable, against taking up this cross; yet there it was before her, in the inexorable hands of conscience, and Grace said, "Do it; take it up and bear it." And Nature and Grace fought. But all the while, down at the bottom of the girl's heart, was a certain knowledge that the cross must be borne; a certain prevision that she would yield and take it up; that she must, if her new determination meant anything; and Rotha felt she could not afford to let it vanish in air. She struggled, rebelled, repined, and ended with yielding. Her will submitted, and she said in her heart, "I must, and I will."

There came a sort of tired lull over her then, which was grateful, after the battle. She considered when she should do this thing, which it was so disagreeable to do. She could not quite make up her mind; but at the first opportunity, whenever that might be. Before she left the house at any rate, if even she had to make the opportunity she wanted.

Then she thought she would return to her little cold room again, before anybody found her in the parlour. She was thoroughly warmed up, she had no more thinking to do just then; and if need be she would lay herself on the bed and cover herself with blankets, and so wait till luncheon time. As she went up stairs, something happened that she did not expect; there stole into her heart as it were a rill of gladness, which swelled and grew. "Yes, Jesus is my King, she thought, and I am his child. O I don't care now for anything, for Jesus is my King, and He will help and take care." She went singing that Name in her heart all the way up stairs; for the first time in her life the sweetness of it was sweet to her; for the first time, the strength of it was something to lean upon. Ay, she was right; she had stepped over the narrow boundary line between the realm of the Prince of this world and the kingdom of Christ. She had submitted herself to the one Ruler; she was no longer under the dominion of the other. And with her first entrance into the kingdom of the Prince of peace, she had stepped out of the darkness into the light, and the air of that new country blew softly upon her. O wonderful! O sweet! O strange! – that such a change should be so quickly made, and yet so hard to make. Rotha had not fought all her battles nor got rid of all her enemies, but that the latter should have no more dominion over her she felt confident. She was a different creature from the Rotha who had fled down stairs an hour or two before in wrath and bitterness.

It was very cold up stairs. She lay down and covered herself with blankets and went to sleep.

She was called to luncheon; got up and smoothed her hair as well as she could with her hands, and thought over what she had to do. She had to set her teeth and go at it like a forlorn-hope upon a battery, but she did not flinch at all.

Mr. Busby was at luncheon, which was unusual and she had not counted upon. He was gracious.

"How do you do, Rotha? Bless me, how you have improved! grown too, I declare."

"There was no need of that, papa," said Antoinette, who was going to be a dumpy.

"What has Mrs. Mowbray done to you? I really hardly know you again."

"Fine feathers, papa."

"Mrs. Mowbray has been very kind to me," Rotha managed to get in quietly.

"She's growing handsome, wife!" Mr. Busby declared as he took his seat at the table.

"You shouldn't say such things to young girls, Mr. Busby," said his wife reprovingly.

"Shouldn't I? Why not? It is expected that they will hear enough of that sort of thing when they get a little older."

"Why should they, Mr. Busby?" asked Rotha, innocently curious.

"Yes indeed, why should they?" echoed her aunt.

"Why should they? I don't know. As I said, it is expected. Young ladies usually demand such tribute from their admirers."

"To tell them they are handsome?" said Rotha.

"Yes," said Mr. Busby looking at her. "Ladies like it. Wouldn't you like it?"

"I should not like it at all," said Rotha colouring with a little excitement. "I don't mind your saying so, Mr. Busby; you have a right to say anything you like to me; but if any stranger said it, I should think he was very impertinent."

"You don't know much yet," said Mr. Busby.

"There is small danger that Rotha will ever be troubled with that sort of impertinence," said Mrs. Busby, with that peculiar air of her head, which always meant that she thought a good deal more than she spoke out at the minute.

"Maybe," returned her husband; "but she is going to deserve it, I can tell you. She'll be handsomer than ever Antoinette will."

Which remark seemed to Rotha peculiarly unlucky for her just that day.

Mrs. Busby reddened with displeasure though she held her tongue.

Antoinette was not capable of such forbearance.

"Papa!" she said, breaking out into tears, "that is very unkind of you!"

"Well, don't snivel," said her father. "You are pretty enough, if you keep a smooth face; but don't you suppose there are other people in the world handsomer? Be sensible."

"It is difficult not to be hurt, Mr. Busby," said his wife, pressing her lips together.

"Mamma!" cried Antoinette in a very injured tone, "he called me 'pretty'?"

"Aint you?" said her father, becoming a little provoked. "I thought you knew you were. But Rotha is going to be a beauty. It is no injury to you, my child."

"You seem to forget it may be an injury to Rotha, Mr. Busby."

Whether Mr. Busby forgot it, or whether he did not care, he made no reply to this suggestion.

"I never tell Antoinette she will be a beauty," Mrs. Busby went on severely.

"Well, I don't think she will. Not her style."

"Is it my style to be ugly, papa?" cried the injured daughter.

"Where will you see such a skin as Antoinette's?" asked the mother.

"Skin isn't everything. My dear, don't be perverse," said Mr. Busby, in his husky tones which sounded so oddly. "Nettie's a pretty little girl, and I am glad of it; but don't you go to making a fool of her by making her think she is more. You had just as fine a skin when I married you; but that wasn't what I married you for."

Rotha wondered what her aunt had married Mr. Busby for! However, if there had once been a peach-blossom skin at one end of the table, perhaps there had been also some corresponding charm at the other end; a sweet voice, for instance. Both equally gone now. Meantime Antoinette was crying, and Mrs. Busby looking more annoyed than Rotha had ever seen her. Her self- command still did not fail her, and she pursed up her lips and kept silence. Rotha wanted a potatoe, but the potatoes were before Mrs. Busby, and she dared not ask for it. The silence was terrible.

"What's the matter, Nettie?" said her father at length. "Don't be silly.

I don't believe Rotha would cry if I told her her skin was brown."

"You've said enough to please Rotha!" Antoinette sobbed.

"And it is unnecessary to be constantly comparing your daughter with some one else," said Mrs. Busby. "Can't we talk of some other subject, more useful and agreeable?"

Then Rotha summoned up her courage, with her heart beating.

"May I speak of another subject?" she said. "Aunt Serena, I have been wanting to tell you – I have been waiting for a chance to tell you – that I want to beg your pardon."

Mrs. Busby made no answer; it was her husband who asked, "For what?"

"To-day, sir, and a good while ago when I was here – different times – I spoke to aunt Serena as I ought not; rudely; I was angry. I have been wanting to say so and to beg her pardon."

"Well, that's all anybody can do," said Mr. Busby. "Enough's said about that. It's very proper, if you spoke improperly, to confess it and make an apology; that's all that is necessary. At least, as soon as Mrs. Busby has signified that she accepts the apology."

But Mrs. Busby signified no such thing. She kept silence.

"My dear, do you want Rotha to say anything more? Hasn't she apologized sufficiently?"

"I should like to know first," Mrs. Busby began in constrained tones, "what motive prompted the apology?"