’I had better tell you that Mary has known my mother’s story for a long time—­but not that she still lived.  My father told her just before his death, and exacted her promise that, if it seemed well, she would repeat everything to me.  You shall know more about it, though it is bad all through.  My dear father had reason bitterly to regret his marriage long before she openly broke it.

’But come and see me, and tell me what is to be done now that we are free to look round.  There is no shame in taking what poor Horace has given us.  You see that there will be at least three thousand pounds for our share, apart from the income we shall have from the business.’

He was sure to come on the evening of the morrow.  Nancy went out before breakfast to post her letter; light-hearted in the assurance that her husband’s days of struggle were over, that her child’s future no longer depended upon the bare hope that its father would live and thrive by a profession so precarious as that of literature, she gave little thought to the details of the new phase of life before her.  Whatever Tarrant proposed would be good in her sight.  Probably he would wish to live in the country; he might discover the picturesque old house of which he had so often spoken.  In any case, they would now live together.  He had submitted her to a probation, and his last letter declared that he was satisfied with the result.

Midway in the morning, whilst she was playing with her little boy, —­rain kept them in the house,—­a knock at the front door announced some unfamiliar visit.  Mary came to the parlour, with a face of surprise.

‘Who is it?’

‘Miss.  Morgan.’

‘What?  Jessica?’

Mary handed an envelope, addressed to ‘Mrs. Tarrant.’  It contained a sheet of paper, on which was written in pencil:  ’I beg you to see me, if only for a minute.’

‘Yes, I will see her,’ said Nancy, when she had frowned in brief reflection.

Mary led away the little boy, and, a moment after, introduced Jessica Morgan.  At the appearance of her former friend, Nancy with difficulty checked an exclamation; Miss.  Morgan wore the garb of the Salvation Army.  Harmonious therewith were the features shadowed by the hideous bonnet:  a face hardly to be recognised, bloodless, all but fleshless, the eyes set in a stare of weak-minded fanaticism.  She came hurriedly forward, and spoke in a quick whisper.

‘I was afraid you would refuse to see me.’

‘Why have you come?’

‘I was impelled—­I had a duty to perform.’

Coldly, Nancy invited her to sit down, but the visitor shook her head.

’I mustn’t take a seat in your house.  I am unwelcome; we can’t pretend to be on terms of friendliness.  I have come, first of all,’ —­her eyes wandered as she spoke, inspecting the room,—­’to humble myself before you—­to confess that I was a dishonourable friend,—­to make known with my lips that I betrayed your secret—­’