“It is a shameful impertinence,” she burst out, introducing the subject herself, when he called to see her.  “I would horsewhip the editor.”  Her indignation was so genuine, and she took his side with such warm good comradeship, that his suspicions vanished for a moment.

“What good?” he answered, cooling down at the sight of her rage.  “It is true, we are to be married, and she has taught school.  I can’t drag her name into a row about it.  Perhaps she never will see it.”

“Oh dear! dear me! what have I done?” the girl cried, with an accent of contrition.  “I never thought of that.  I was so angry that I cut it out and put it in the letter that was to contain nothing but congratulations, and told her how perfectly outrageous I thought it.  How stupid!” and there was a world of trouble in her big dark eyes, while she looked up penitently, as if to ask his forgiveness for a great crime.

“Well, it cannot be helped,” Henderson said, with a little touch of sympathy for Carmen’s grief.  “Those who know her will think it simply malicious, and the others will not think of it a second time.”

“But I cannot forgive myself for my stupidity.  I’m not sure but I’d rather you’d think me wicked than stupid,” she continued, with the smile in her eyes that most men found attractive.  “I confess—­is that very bad?—­that I feel it more for you than for her.  But” ( she thought she saw a shade in his face) “I warn you, if you are not very nice, I shall transfer my affections to her.”

The girl was in her best mood, with the manner of a confiding, intimate friend.  She talked about Margaret, but not too much, and a good deal more about Henderson and his future, not laying too great stress upon the marriage, as if it were, in fact, only an incident in his career, contriving always to make herself appear as a friend, who hadn’t many illusions or much romance, to be sure, but who could always be relied on in any mood or any perplexity, and wouldn’t be frightened or very severe at any confidences.  She posed as a woman who could make allowances, and whose friendship would be no check or hinderance.  This was conveyed in manner as much as in words, and put Henderson quite at his ease.  He was not above the weakness of liking the comradeship of a woman of whom he was not afraid, a woman to whom he could say anything, a woman who could make allowances.  Perhaps he was hardly conscious of this.  He knew Carmen better than she thought he knew her, and he couldn’t approve of her as a wife; and yet the fact was that she never gave him any moral worries.

“Yes,” she said, when the talk drifted that way, “the chrysalis earl has gone.  I think that mamma is quite inconsolable.  She says she doesn’t understand girls, or men, or anything, these days.”

“Do you?” asked Henderson, lightly.

“I?  No.  I’m an agnostic—­except in religion.  Have you got it into your head, my friend, that I ever fancied Mr. Lyon?”