"Hold on, Sir Victor," Mr. Catheron, interposed, "let me ask this
young lady a question or two. Ethel, do you remember May, two years
ago in Scotland? Look at this picture; it's yours, isn't it? Look at
this ring on my little finger; you gave it to me, didn't you? Think of
the little Glasgow presbytery where we went through the ceremony, and
deny that I'm your husband, if you can."

But her blood was up--gentle, yielding, timid, she had yet a spirit of
her own, and her share of British "pluck."

She faced her accuser like a small, fair-haired lioness, her eyes
flashing blue fire.

"I do deny it! You wretch, how dare you come here with such a lie!"
She turned her back upon him with a scorn under which even he winced.
"Victor!" she cried, lifting her clasped hands to her husband, "hear
me and forgive me if you can. I have done wrong--wrong--but I--I was
afraid, and I thought he was drowned. I wanted to tell you all--I did,
indeed, but papa and mamma were afraid--afraid of losing you, Victor.
I told you a falsehood about the photograph--he, that wretch, did give
it to me, and--" her face drooped with a bitter sob--"he was my lover
then, years ago, in Scotland."

"Ah!" quoted Mr. Catheron, "truth is mighty and will prevail! Tell it,
Ethel; the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."

"Silence, sir!" Lady Catheron cried, "and don't dare call me Ethel. I
was only fifteen, Victor--think of it, a child of fifteen, spending my
holidays in Glasgow when I met him. And he dared to make love to me.
It amused him for the time--representing himself as a sort of banished