e last train
in the evening; and I sat down to supper with those two harmless young
creatures, knowing I must prepare the husband for what threatened them,
and weakly deferring it, when I found myself in their presence, until
the next day. Eunice was, in some degree, answerable for this hesitation
on my part. No one could look at her husband, and fail to see that he
was a supremely happy man. But I detected signs of care in the wife's
face.

Before breakfast the next morning I was out on the beach, trying to
decide how the inevitable disclosure might be made. Eunice joined me.
Now, when we were alone, I asked if she was really and completely happy.
Quietly and sadly she answered: "Not yet."

I hardly knew what to say. My face must have expressed disappointment
and surprise.

"I shall never be quite happy," she resumed, "till I know what it is
that you kept from me on that memorable day. I don't like having a
secret from my husband--though it is not _my_ secret."

"Remember your promise," I said

"I don't forget it," she answered. "I can only wish that my promise
would keep back the thoughts that come to me in spite of myself."

"What thoughts?"

"There is something, as I fear, in the story of my parents which you are
afraid to confide to me. Why did Mr. Gracedieu allow me to believe and
leave everybody to believe, that I was his own child?"

"My dear, I relieved your mind of those doubts on the morning of your
marriage."

"No. I was only thinking of myself at that time. My mother--the doubt of
_her_ is the doubt that torments me now."

"What do you mean?"

She put her arm in mine, and held by it with both hands.

"The mock-mother!" she whispered. "Do you remember that dreadful Vision,
that horrid whispering temptation in the dead of night? _Was_ it a
mock-mother? Oh, pity me! I don't know who my mother was. One horrid
thought about her is a burden on my mind. If she was a good woman, you
who love me would surely have made me happy by speaking of her?"

Those words decided me at last. Could she suffer more than she had
suffered already, if I trusted her with the truth? I ran the risk. There
was a time of silence that filled me with terror. The interval passed.
She took my hand, and put it to her heart. "Does it beat as if I was
frightened?" she asked.

No! It was beating calmly.

"Does it relieve your anxiety?"

It told me that I had not surprised her. That unforgotten Vision of the
night had prep