I do not know. Mother told me, but would not tell where she
received her information. I heard of it again in a few days, and have
reason to believe that Mrs. Banker knows it too and feels a little
uncomfortable that her son should be refused when she considers him
worthy of the empress herself."

Helen was very white, and her limbs shook as she asked: "And how with
Mark and Juno?"

"Oh, off and on," Bell replied; "that is, Juno is always on, while Mark
is more uncertain, and Juno really has improved in some respects. As I
wrote you once, she is very docile when with Mark, and acts as if trying
to atone for something--her old badness, I guess. You are certain you
never cared for Mark Ray?"

This was so abrupt and Bell's eyes were so searching that Helen grew
giddy for a moment and grasped the back of the chair, as she replied: "I
did not say I never cared for him. I said he never proposed; and that is
true; he never did."

"And if he had?" Bell continued, never taking her eyes from Helen, who,
had she been less agitated, would have denied Bell's right to question
her so closely. Now, however, she answered blindly: "I do not know. I
cannot tell. I thought him engaged to Juno."

"Well, if that is not the rarest case of cross-purposes that I ever
knew," Bell said, wiping her hands upon Aunt Betsy's apron, and
preparing to attack the piled up basket just brought in.

Further conversation was impossible, and, with her mind in a perfect
tempest of thought, Helen went away, trying to decide what it was best
for her to do. Some one had spread the report that she had refused Mark
Ray, telling of the refusal, of course, or how else could it have been
known? and this accounted for Mrs. Banker's long-continued silence.
Since Helen's return to Silverton Mrs. Banker had written two or thee
kind, friendly letters, which did her so much good; but these had
suddenly ceased, and Helen's last remained as yet unanswered. She saw
the reason now, every nerve quivering with pain as she imagined what
Mrs. Banker must think of one who could make a refusal public, or what
was tenfold worse, pretend to an offer she never received. "She must
despise me, and Mark Ray, too, if he has heard of it," she said,
resolving one moment to ask Bell to explain to Mrs. Banker, and then
changing her mind and concluding to let matters take their course,
inasmuch as interference from her might be construed by the mother into
undue interest in the son. "Perh