“Nothing of the kind.”

“Can I be of any use to you?”

“You might be of the greatest use.  But I know only too well, you would refuse.”

Thus far, Mrs. Presty had been animated by curiosity.  She began now to feel vaguely alarmed.  “After all that I have done for you,” she answered, “I don’t think you ought to say that.  Why should I refuse?”

Catherine hesitated.

Her mother persisted in pressing her.  “Has it anything to do with Captain Bennydeck?”

“Yes.”

“What is it?”

Catherine roused her courage.

“You know what it is as well as I do,” she said.  “Captain Bennydeck believes that I am free to marry him because I am a widow.  You might help me to tell him the truth.”

“What!!!”

That exclamation of horror and astonishment was loud enough to have been heard in the garden.  If Mrs. Presty’s hair had been all her own, it must have been hair that stood on end.

Catherine quietly rose.  “We won’t discuss it,” she said, with resignation.  “I knew you would refuse me.”  She approached the door.  Her mother got up and resolutely stood in the way.  “Before you commit an act of downright madness,” Mrs. Presty said, “I mean to try if I can stop you.  Go back to your chair.”

Catherine refused.

“I know how it will end,” she answered; “and the sooner it ends the better.  You will find that I am quite as determined as you are.  A man who loves me as he loves me, is a man whom I refuse to deceive.”

“Let’s have it out plainly,” Mrs. Presty insisted.  “He believes your first marriage has been dissolved by death.  Do you mean to tell him that it has been dissolved by Divorce?”

“I do.”

“What right has he to know it?”

“A right that is not to be denied.  A wife must have no secrets from her husband.”

Mrs. Presty hit back smartly.

“You’re not his wife yet.  Wait till you are married.”

“Never!  Who but a wretch would marry an honest man under false pretenses?”

“I deny the false pretenses!  You talk as if you were an impostor.  Are you, or are you not, the accomplished lady who has charmed him?  Are you, or are you not, the beautiful woman whom he loves?  There isn’t a stain on your reputation.  In every respect you are the wife he wants and the wife who is worthy of him.  And you are cruel enough to disturb the poor man about a matter that doesn’t concern him! you are fool enough to raise doubts of you in his mind, and give him a reproach to cast in your teeth the first time you do anything that happens to offend him!  Any woman—­I don’t care who she may be—­might envy the home that’s waiting for you and your child, if you’re wise enough to hold your tongue.  Upon my word, Catherine, I am ashamed of you.  Have you no principles?”

She really meant it!  The purely selfish considerations which she urged on her daughter were so many undeniable virtues in Mrs. Presty’s estimation.  She took the highest moral ground, and stood up and crowed on it, with a pride in her own principles which the Primate of all England might have envied.