yet full of hidden
misery. He would surely answer that.

No! No response--not even anger. Some sorrow perhaps, but a sorrow that
was stern, hopeless, undemonstrative, as was his own nature. If any
wreck had been, it had already sank down into those deep waters, of
which the surface appeared perpetually calm.

Agatha threw him back another look. Scorn was there and hatred--she felt
as though she did really hate him at that moment. Her heart gave a
leap, like a smitten deer, and then a "laughing devil" seemed to enter
therein, and dash her on--anywhere--to anything.

"Come, Mary--come Eulalie, we must be very merry tonight, and my husband
must join, for all his solemnity. Shake it off quick, Mr. Harper, or
we'll call you a deciever--a smooth-faced, smiling cheat."

Laughing out loud--she caught his hand, wrung it violently, and struck
it aside.

"How comical you are!" said the languid Eulalie.

"But," whispered sensible Mary, "are you quite sure Nathanael liked the
joke."

"Who cares?" Yet Agatha looked back.

He had merely drawn his hand in again to the other, and his colour
faintly rose. Otherwise the poor, mad, passionate girl might as well
have dashed herself against a rock. She grew still again, with a kind of
fear. Her very limbs tottered as she went towards the drawing-room, and
all the time that she lay there on the sofa, Mary bustling about her and
chattering all kinds of domestic nothings, Agatha saw, as in a vision,
her husband's face, so beautiful in its very sternness, so pure and
righteous-looking, whilst she felt herself so desperately, daringly
wicked. All the "black, ingrained spots," which had become visible
in her soul, and she knew herself to be worse than any one knew
her--appeared gathering in one cloud, until she sickened at her own
likeness. For beside it rose another image--and such an one! Yet there
was a time when she had thought it a great sacrifice and condescension
that Nathanael should be allowed to love her. Now--

No, she dared not hear the cry of her heart. She dared not do anything
but hate him, as he must surely hate her. Had he stood before her that
minute, she would have flung away this softness, made her flashing eyes
burn up their tears, and appeared all indifference. He might if he chose
be as cold as ice, as proud as Lucifer;--she would be the same. She
would never once let him suspect that which this day's misery had shown
her was kindling in her heart. A something, be