infer the sort from the
worst appearance she has made in the whole business, I think she has
done pretty well."

"Why had she left the Brown girl to take all your resentment alone for
the last six or eight months?"

"She may have thought that she was getting her share of the punishment
in the fever my resentment brought on?"

"Philip, do you really believe that her fever, if she had one, came from
that?"

"I think she believes it, and there's no doubt but she was badly
scared."

"Oh, there's no doubt of that!"

"But come, mother, why should we take her at the worst? Of course, she
has a complex nature. I see that as clearly as you do. I don't believe
we look at her diversely, in the smallest particular. But why shouldn't
a complex nature be credited with the same impulses towards the truth as
a single nature? Why shouldn't we allow that Miss Shirley had the same
wish to set herself right with me as Miss Andrews would have had in her
place?"

"I dare say she wished to set herself right with you, but not from the
same wish that Miss Andrews would have had. Miss Andrews would not have
wished you to know the truth for her own sake. Her motive would have
been direct-straight."

"Yes; and we will describe her as a straight line, and Miss Shirley as a
waving line. Why shouldn't the waving line, at its highest points, touch
the same altitude as the straight line?"

"It wouldn't touch it all the time, and in character, or nature, as you
call it, that is the great thing. It's at the lowest points that the
waving line is dangerous."

"Well, I don't deny that. But I'm anxious to be just to a person who
hasn't experienced a great deal of mercy for what, after all, wasn't
such a very heinous thing as I used to think it. You must allow that she
wasn't obliged to tell me anything about herself."

"Yes, she was, Philip. As I said before, she hadn't the physical or
moral strength to keep it from you when she was brought face to face
with you. Besides--" Mrs. Verrian hesitated.

"Out with it, mother! We, at least, won't have any concealments."

"She may have thought, she could clinch it in that way."

"Clinch what?"

"You know. Is she pretty?"

"She's--interesting."

"That can always be managed. Is she tall?"

"NO, I think she's rather out of style there; she's rather petite."

"And what's her face like?"

"Well, she has no particular complexion, but it's not thick. Her eyes
are the best of her, though there i