“If it had not been necessary,” she answered, “do you think I could have forced myself to mention it to you? Let me remind you that I am here on sufferance.  If I don’t speak plainly (no matter at what sacrifice to my own feelings), I make my situation more embarrassing than it is already.  I have something to tell Mrs. Glenarm relating to the anonymous letters which she has lately received.  And I have a word to say to her, next, about her contemplated marriage.  Before you allow me to do this, you ought to know who I am. (I have owned it.) You ought to have heard the worst that can be said of my conduct. (Your face tells me you have heard the worst.) After the forbearance you have shown to me, as a perfect stranger, I will not commit the meanness of taking you by surprise.  Perhaps, Mr. Delamayn, you understand, now, why I felt myself obliged to refer to your brother.  Will you trust me with permission to speak to Mrs. Glenarm?”

It was simply and modestly said—­with an unaffected and touching resignation of look and manner.  Julius gave her back the respect and the sympathy which, for a moment, he had unjustly withheld from her.

“You have placed a confidence in me,” he said “which most persons in your situation would have withheld.  I feel bound, in return to place confidence in you.  I will take it for granted that your motive in this matter is one which it is my duty to respect.  It will be for Mrs. Glenarm to say whether she wishes the interview to take place or not.  All that I can do is to leave you free to propose it to her.  You are free.”

As he spoke the sound of the piano reached them from the music-room.  Julius pointed to the glass door which opened on to the terrace.

“You have only to go in by that door,” he said, “and you will find Mrs. Glenarm alone.”

Anne bowed, and left him.  Arrived at the short flight of steps which led up to the door, she paused to collect her thoughts before she went in.

A sudden reluctance to go on and enter the room took possession of her, as she waited with her foot on the lower step.  The report of Mrs. Glenarm’s contemplated marriage had produced no such effect on her as Sir Patrick had supposed:  it had found no love for Geoffrey left to wound, no latent jealousy only waiting to be inflamed.  Her object in taking the journey to Perth was completed when her correspondence with Geoffrey was in her own hands again.  The change of purpose which had brought her to Swanhaven was due entirely to the new view of her position toward Mrs. Glenarm which the coarse commonsense of Bishopriggs had first suggested to her.  If she failed to protest against Mrs. Glenarm’s marriage, in the interests of the reparation which Geoffrey owed to her, her conduct would only confirm Geoffrey’s audacious assertion that she was a married woman already.  For her own sake she might still have hesitated to move in the matter.  But Blanche’s interests were concerned as well as her own; and, for Blanche’s sake, she had resolved on making the journey to Swanhaven Lodge.