's wise example. Mrs. Valeria, permit
me to compose myself."

Gravely arranging his embroidery, this extraordinary being began to work
with the patient and nimble dexterity of an accomplished needle-woman.

"Now," said Miserrimus Dexter, "if you are ready, I am. You talk--I
work. Please begin."

I obeyed him, and began.

CHAPTER XXVIII. IN THE DARK.

WITH such a man as Miserrimus Dexter, and with such a purpose as I had
in view, no half-confidences were possible. I must either risk the most
unreserved acknowledgment of the interests that I really had at stake,
or I must make the best excuse that occurred to me for abandoning my
contemplated experiment at the last moment. In my present critical
situation, no such refuge as a middle course lay before me--even if I
had been inclined to take it. As things were, I ran risks, and plunged
headlong into my own affairs at starting.

"Thus far, you know little or nothing about me, Mr. Dexter," I said.
"You are, as I believe, quite unaware that my husband and I are not
living together at the present time."

"Is it necessary to mention your husband?" he asked, coldly, without
looking up from his embroidery, and without pausing in his work.

"It is absolutely necessary," I answered. "I can explain myself to you
in no other way."

He bent his head, and sighed resignedly.

"You and your husband are not living together at the present time," he
resumed. "Does that mean that Eustace has left you?"

"He has left me, and has gone abroad."

"Without any necessity for it?"

"Without the least necessity."

"Has he appointed no time for his return to you?"

"If he persevere in his present resolution, Mr. Dexter, Eustace will
never return to me."

For the first time he raised his head from his embroidery--with a sudden
appearance of interest.

"Is the quarrel so serious as that?" he asked. "Are you free of each
other, pretty Mrs. Valeria, by common consent of both parties?"

The tone in which he put the question was not at all to my liking. The
look he fixed on me was a look which unpleasantly suggested that I had
trusted myself alone with him, and that he might end in taking advantage
of it. I reminded him quietly, by my manner more than by my words, of
the respect which he owed to me.

"You are entirely mistaken," I said. "There is no anger--there is not
even a misunderstanding between us. Our parting has cost bitter sorrow,
Mr. Dexter, to him and to me."

He su