Amelius
went on. "If a man had asked me to steal into the house on tiptoe, I
should have said--well! I should have said something I had better not
repeat. If a man had stood between me and the door when you came back, I
should have taken him by the collar and pulled him out of my way. Could
I do that, if you please, with Mrs. Farnaby?"

Regina saw the weak point of this defence with a woman's quickness of
perception. "I can't offer any opinion," she said; "especially when you
lay all the blame on my aunt."

Amelius opened his lips to protest--and thought better of it. He wisely
went straight on with what he had still to say.

"If you will let me finish," he resumed, "you will understand me a
little better than that. Whatever blame there may be, Miss Regina, I am
quite ready to take on myself. I merely wanted to remind you that I was
put in an awkward position, and that I couldn't civilly find a way out
of it. As for your aunt, I will only say this: I know of hardly any
sacrifice that I would not submit to, if I could be of the smallest
service to her. After what I heard, while I was in her room--"

Regina interrupted him at that point. "I suppose it's a secret between
you?" she said.

"Yes; it's a secret," Amelius proceeded, "as you say. But one thing I
may tell you, without breaking my promise. Mrs. Farnaby has--well! has
filled me with kindly feeling towards her. She has a claim, poor soul,
to my truest sympathy. And I shall remember her claim. And I shall be
faithful to what I feel towards her as long as I live!"

It was not very elegantly expressed; but the tone was the tone of true
feeling in his voice trembled, his colour rose. He stood before her,
speaking with perfect simplicity straight from his heart--and the
woman's heart felt it instantly. This was the man whose ridicule she had
dreaded, if her aunt's rash confidence struck him in an absurd light!
She sat down in silence, with a grave sad face, reproaching herself for
the wrong which her too ready distrust had inflicted on him; longing to
ask his pardon, and yet hesitating to say the simple words.

He approached her chair, and, placing his hand on the back of it, said
gently, "do you think a little better of me now?"

She had taken off her gloves: she silently folded and refolded them in
her lap.

"Your good opinion is very precious to me," Amelius pleaded, bending
a little nearer to her. "I can't tell you how sorry I should be--" He
stopped, and