CHAPTER IV

THE COUNTESS





The countess, as she walked back with her daughter towards the
house, had to bethink herself for a minute or two as to how she
should act, and what she would say. She knew, she felt that she
knew, what had occurred. If her daughter's manner had not told her,
the downcast eyes, the repressed sobs, the mingled look of shame and
fear;--if she had not read the truth from these, she would have
learned it from the tone of Fitzgerald's voice, and the look of
triumph which sat upon his countenance.

And then she wondered that this should be so, seeing that she had
still regarded Clara as being in all things a child; and as she
thought further, she wondered at her own fatuity, in that she had
allowed herself to be so grossly deceived.

"Clara," said she, "what is all this?"