“Do you really mean it?” she asked.

“I do, indeed.”

“Are you actually simple enough, Stella, to think that a man of
Romayne’s temper would have made you his wife if you had told him of the
Brussels marriage?”

“Why not?”

“Why not!  Would Romayne—­would any man—­believe that you really did part from Winterfield at the church door?  Considering that you are a married woman, your innocence, my sweet child, is a perfect phenomenon!  It’s well there were wiser people than you to keep your secret.”

“Don’t speak too positively, mama.  Lewis may find it out yet.”

“Is that one of your presentiments?”

“Yes.”

“How is he to find it out, if you please?”

“I am afraid, through Father Benwell.  Yes! yes!  I know you only think him a fawning old hypocrite—­you don’t fear him as I do.  Nothing will persuade me that zeal for his religion is the motive under which that man acts in devoting himself to Romayne.  He has some abominable object in view, and his eyes tell me that I am concerned in it.”

Mrs. Eyrecourt burst out laughing.

“What is there to laugh at?” Stella asked.

“I declare, my dear, there is something absolutely provoking in your utter want of knowledge of the world!  When you are puzzled to account for anything remarkable in a clergyman’s conduct (I don’t care, my poor child, to what denomination he belongs) you can’t be wrong in attributing his motive to—­Money.  If Romayne had turned Baptist or Methodist, the reverend gentleman in charge of his spiritual welfare would not have forgotten—­as you have forgotten, you little goose—­that his convert was a rich man.  His mind would have dwelt on the chapel, or the mission, or the infant school, in want of funds; and—­with no more abominable object in view than I have, at this moment, in poking the fire—­he would have ended in producing his modest subscription list and would have betrayed himself (just as our odious Benwell will betray himself) by the two amiable little words, Please contribute.  Is there any other presentiment, my dear, on which you would like to have your mother’s candid opinion?”

Stella resignedly took up the book again.

“I daresay you are right,” she said.  “Let us read our novel.”

Before she had reached the end of the first page, her mind was far away again from the unfortunate story.  She was thinking of that “other presentiment,” which had formed the subject of her mother’s last satirical inquiry.  The vague fear that had shaken her when she had accidentally touched the French boy, on her visit to Camp’s Hill, still from time to time troubled her memory.  Even the event of his death had failed to dissipate the delusion, which associated him with some undefined evil influence that might yet assert itself.  A superstitious forewarning of this sort was a weakness new to her in her experience of herself.  She was heartily ashamed of it—­and yet it kept its hold.  Once more the book dropped on her lap.  She laid it aside, and walked wearily to the window to look at the weather.