Anna--what is there for her to know? Fear not. Your old father--he
will understand and will forgive--will forgive anything in all this
world--no matter what. Remember that. Remember that, and tell me,
Anna, what is there for Mrs. Vanderlyn to pardon?"

She did not lift her head. Her eyes flashed up at him in one quick
look of terror, but never by an inch did she raise toward her
father's, now, her pale, affrighted face. "It was a great temptation,
father," she said slowly. "A very great temptation."

Now he was alarmed, indeed. "Anna," he demanded, in a voice that was
not like his own, "what have you done? What have you done?"

Every horrid thought--but one--which could flash into being in the
human mind at such a time, rushed into his, in a terrific jumble of
mad speculations.

For a moment Anna cowered, alarmed by what a quick glimpse of his face
had shown her. She had never seen a human face so--not whitened by his
fear, but greyed--greyed as if seared with fire and turned to carven
ashes. She could tell, by that, that he would never, really, forgive
her. Too firmly had his hopes been fixed upon the plans which he had
built in many long hours of reflections going back along the years, no
doubt, to that far time when she was lying, a mere babe, in her dear
mother's arms. How ardently she wished, now, at this crisis, that that
mother might be there to soften things for her; to turn his wrath,
explain, make clear to him the fact that there are impulses too strong
for women's hearts to put aside!

She did not look at him again--she could not bear to see that face