ould make you happy if I could. I will make you happy if it is in my
power to do so, but I can hold out no hope--none, none."

"Nor tell me why?"

"Nor tell you why."

"Mamma, you suffer. I see it now, and somehow it makes it easier for me
to bear my own suffering. You do not willfully deny me what is as much
as my life to me."

"Willfully! Honora! Listen." The mother had stopped in her walk, for I
heard her restless tread no more. "You say that I suffer, child. I have
never had one happy day. Whatever romance you have woven about me, I
have never known, from the hour of my birth till now, one moment of such
delight as you experienced when you saw the character of the marquis
unfold before you so grandly. The nearest I have ever come to bliss was
when you were first placed in my arms. Then, indeed, for one wild
moment, I felt the baptism of true love. I looked at you, and my heart
opened. Alas! it was to take in pain as well as joy. You had the face--
Oh, Heaven! what am I saying? This darkness unnerves me, Honora. Let us
have light, light, anything to keep my reason from faltering."

"Mother, mother, you are ill!"

"No. I am simply weak. I always am when I recall your birth and the
first few days that followed it. I was so glad to have something I could
really love; so glad to feel that my heart beat, and to know that it
beat for one so innocent, so sweet, so helpless as yourself. What if I
had pains and hours of darkness, did I not have your smile, also, and,
later on, your love? Child, if there has been any good in my life--and
sometimes I have thought there was a little--it came from you. So, never
even question again if I could hurt you willfully. I not only could not
do this and live, but to save you from pain I would dare-- What would I
not dare? Let man or angels say."

Before such passion as this young Honora sank helpless.

"Oh, mamma, mamma," she moaned, "forgive me. I did not know--how could
I know? Don't sob, mamma, dear; let me hold you--so; now lay your cheek
against mine and simply love me. I will lie quite still and ask no
questions, and you will rest, too; and God will bless us, as he always
blesses the loving and the true."

But madame did not comply with this endearing request. Satisfying her
daughter with a few kisses and some words that the paroxysm of her grief
was past, she resumed her walk up and down the room, pausing every now
and then as if to listen, and hastily resuming her walk a