atest secret of all) she wrote
to them that she had performed a part of the journey through France in
_diligance!_

Of course, they would see the next day; Miss Mildred was sure she should
know in a moment whether Agnes would like them. She could never have
told him all this if her sister had been there, and Captain Benyon must
promise never to reveal to Kate how she had chattered. Kate thought
always that they must hide everything, and that even if Agnes should be
a dreadful disappointment they must never let any one guess it And yet
Kate was just the one who would suffer, in the coming years, after she
herself had gone. Their brother had been everything to them, but now
it would all be different Of course it was not to be expected that he
should have remained a bachelor for their sake; she only wished he had
waited till she was dead and Kate was married One of these events,
it was true, was much less sure than the other; Kate might never
marry,--much as she wished she would! She was quite morbidly unselfish,
and did n't think she had a right to have anything of her own--not even
a husband. Miss Mildred talked a good while about Kate, and it never
occurred to her that she might bore Captain Benyon. She did n't, in
point of fact; he had none of the trouble of wondering why this poor,
sick, worried lady was trying to push her sister down his throat Their
peculiar situation made everything natural, and the tone she took with
him now seemed only what their pleasant relation for the last three
months led up to. Moreover, he had an excellent reason for not being
bored: the fact, namely, that after all, with regard to her sister,
Miss Mildred appeared to him to keep back more than she uttered. She
didn't tell him the great thing,--she had nothing to say as to what that
charming girl thought of Eaymond Benyon. The effect of their interview,
indeed, was to make him shrink from knowing, and he felt that the right
thing for him would be to get back into his boat, which was waiting at
the garden steps, before Kate Theory should return from Naples. It came
over him, as he sat there, that he was far too interested in knowing
what this young lady thought of him. She might think what she pleased;
it could make no difference to him. The best opinion in the world--if it
looked out at him from her tender eyes--would not make him a whit more
free or more happy. Women of that sort were not for him, women whom one
could not see familiarly w