it."

And a pause again, with this, fell upon them; which Densher, however,
presently broke. "If you don't think Mrs. Stringham's news 'real' what
do you think of Lord Mark's?"

She didn't think anything. "Lord Mark's?"

"You haven't seen him?"

"Not since he saw her."

"You've known then of his seeing her?"

"Certainly. From Mrs. Stringham."

"And have you known," Densher went on, "the rest?"

Kate wondered. "What rest?"

"Why everything. It was his visit that she couldn't stand--it was what
then took place that simply killed her."

"Oh!" Kate seriously breathed. But she had turned pale, and he saw
that, whatever her degree of ignorance of these connexions, it wasn't
put on. "Mrs. Stringham hasn't said _that_."

He observed none the less that she didn't ask what had then taken
place; and he went on with his contribution to her knowledge. "The way
it affected her was that it made her give up. She has given up beyond
all power to care again, and that's why she's dying."

"Oh!" Kate once more slowly sighed, but with a vagueness that made him
pursue.

"One can see now that she was living by will--which was very much what
you originally told me of her."

"I remember. That was it."

"Well then her will, at a given moment, broke down, and the collapse
was determined by that fellow's dastardly stroke. He told her, the
scoundrel, that you and I are secretly engaged."

Kate gave a quick glare. "But he doesn't know it!"

"That doesn't matter. _She_ did by the time he had left her. Besides,"
Densher added, "he does know it. When," he continued, "did you last see
him?"

But she was lost now in the picture before her. "_That_ was what made
her worse?"

He watched her take it in--it so added to her sombre beauty. Then he
spoke as Mrs. Stringham had spoken. "She turned her face to the wall."

"Poor Milly!" said Kate.

Slight as it was, her beauty somehow gave it style; so that he
continued consistently: "She learned it, you see, too soon--since of
course one's idea had been that she might never even learn it at all.
And she _had_ felt sure--through everything we had done--of there not
being between us, so far at least as you were concerned, anything she
need regard as a warning."

She took another moment for thought. "It wasn't through anything _you_
did--whatever that may have been--that she gained her certainty. It was
by the conviction she got from me."

"Oh it's very handsome," Densher said, "for yo