Lovering spoke hurriedly. As soon as practicable, the whole
affair was related.

"And is that all?" exclaimed Mr. Lovering, in surprise. "Pooh! pooh!
I'm really astonished! I thought that some dreadful thing had
happened."

"Don't you regard this as a very serious matter?" inquired Mrs.
Waring.

"Serious? No! It's a thing of every day occurrence. If you are not a
judge of the goods you attempt to purchase, you must expect to pay
for your ignorance. Shopkeepers have to make up their ratio of
profits in the aggregate sales of the day. Sometimes they have to
sell a sharp customer at cost, rather than lose the sale; and this
must be made up on some one like you."

"Not a serious matter," replied Fanny's aunt, "to discover that the
betrothed of your daughter is a dishonest man?"

"Nonsense! nonsense! you don't know what you are talking about,"
said Mr. Lovering, fretfully. "He's shrewd and sharp, as every
business-man who expects to succeed must be. As to his trade
operations, Fanny has nothing to do with them. He'll make her a kind
husband, and provide for her handsomely. What more can she ask?"

"A great deal more," replied Mrs. Waring, firmly.

"What more, pray?"

"A husband, in whose high moral virtues, and unselfish regard for
the right, she can unerringly confide. One who will never, in his
eager desire to secure for himself some personal end or
gratification, forget what is due to the tender, confiding wife who
has placed all that is dear to her in his guardianship. Brother,
depend upon it, the man who deliberately wrongs another to gain an
advantage to himself, will never, in marriage, make a truly virtuous
woman happy. This I speak thoughtfully and solemnly; and I pray you
take it to heart, ere conviction of what I assert comes upon you too
late. But, I may have said too much. Forgive my plain speaking. From
the fulness of the heart is this utterance."

And so saying, Mrs. Waring passed from the room, and left the
parents of Fanny alone with their weeping child. Few words were
spoken by either Mr. or Mrs. Lovering. Something in the last remarks
of Mrs. Waring had startled their minds into new convictions. As for
the daughter, she soon retired to her own apartment, and did not
join the family again until the next morning. Then, her sad eyes and
colorless face too plainly evidenced a night of sleeplessness and
suffering.

By a kind of tacit consent on the part of each member of the family,
no allusion,