't Miss at all. She was a
married woman." Henry nodded again. "She had not lived with her
husband long, however, and she had been married some twenty years
ago. She was older than she looked. For some reason she did not get
on with him, and he left her. I don't myself feel that I know what
the reason was, although she pretended to tell me. She seemed to have
a feeling, poor soul, that, beautiful as she was, she excited
repulsion rather than affection in everybody with whom she came in
contact. 'I might as well be a snake as a woman.' Those were just her
words, and, God help her, I do believe there was something true about
them, although for the life of me I don't know why it was."

Henry looked at Horace with the eyes of a philosopher. "Maybe it was
because she wanted to charm," he said.

Horace shot a surprised glance at him. He had not expected anything
like that from Henry, even though he had long said to himself that
there were depths below the commonplace surface.

"Perhaps you are right," he said, reflectively. "I don't know but you
are. She was a great beauty, and possibly the knowledge of it made
her demand too much, long for too much, so that people dimly realized
it and were repelled instead of being attracted. I think she loved
her husband for a long time after he left her. I think she loved many
others, men and women. I think she loved women better than a woman
usually does, and women could not abide her. That I know; even the
school-girls fought shy of her."

"I have seen the Ayres girl with her," said Henry.

Horace changed color. "She is not one of the school-girls," he
replied, hastily.

"I think I have heard Sylvia say that Mrs. Ayres had asked her there
to tea."

"Yes, I believe she has. I think perhaps the Ayres family have paid
some attention to her," Horace said, constrainedly.

"I have seen the Ayres girl with her a good deal, I know," said Henry.

"Very possibly, I dare say. Well, Miss Farrel did not think she or
any one else cared about her very much. She told me that none of her
pupils did, and I could not gainsay her, and then she told me what I
feel that I must tell you." Horace paused. Henry waited.

Then Horace resumed. He spoke briefly and to the purpose.

"Miss Abrahama White, who left her property to your wife, had a
sister," he said. "The sister went away and married, and there was a
daughter. First the father died, then the mother. The daughter, a
mere child at the time, w