“Yes, I remember; and you were surprised that I trusted them to you.  And now you expect me to believe that you have abused that trust, deceived me, broken a rule which in your father’s house and by all our Order is held sacred as the rings of the Signet, for a drug which twelve days ago you disliked as much as I?”

“It is true.”

The words were spoken with downcast eyes, in the low faltering tone natural to a confession of disgrace.

“It is not true, Eveena; or if true in form, false in matter.  If it were possible that you could wish to deceive me, you knew it could not be for long.”

“I meant to be found out,” she interrupted, “only not yet.”

She had betrayed herself, stung by words that seemed to express the one doubt she could not nerve herself to endure—­doubt of her loyalty to me.  Before I could speak, she looked up hastily, and began to retract.  I stopped her.

“I see—­when you had done with it.  But, Eveena, why conceal it?  Do you think I would not have given this or all the contents of the chest into your hands, and asked no question?”

“Do you mean it?  Could you have so trusted me?”

“My child! is it difficult to trust where I know there is no temptation to wrong?  Do you think that to-day I have doubted or suspected you, even while you have accused yourself?  I cannot guess at your motive, but I am as sure as ever of your loyalty.  Take these things,”—­forcing back upon her the phial and the magnets,—­“yes, and the test-stone.” ...  She burst into passionate tears.

“I cannot endure this.  If I had dreamed your patience would have borne with me half so far, I would never have tried it so, even for your own sake.  I meant to be found out and accept the consequences in silence.  But you trust me so, that I must tell you what I wanted to conceal.  When you kept on the surface it made me so ill”—–­

“But, Eveena, if the remedy be not worse than the sickness, why not ask for it openly?”

“It was not that.  Don’t you understand?  Of course, I would bear any suffering rather than have done this; but then you would have found me out at once.  I wanted to conceal my suffering, not to escape it.”

“My child! my child! how could you put us both to all this pain?”

“You know you would not have given me the draught; you would have left the surface at once; and I cannot bear to be always in the way, always hindering your pleasures, and even your discoveries.  You came across a distance that makes a bigger world than this look less than that light, through solitude and dangers and horrors I cannot bear to think of, to see and examine this world of ours.  And then you leave things unseen or half-seen, you spoil your work, because a girl is seasick!  You ran great risk of death and got badly hurt to see what our hunting was like, and you will not let my head ache that you may find out what our sea-storms and currents are!  How