He stopped, and then added with a burst, "I was waiting till I could
put it to you in some favourable light."

"I'm glad you're honest about it at last, my dear!"

"Yes. And while I was waiting I forgot Barker's letter altogether. I
put it away somewhere--I can't recollect just where, at the moment.
But that makes no difference; he's here with the whole poem in his
pocket, now." Sewell gained a little courage from his wife's
forbearance; she knew that she could trust him in all great matters,
and perhaps she thought that for this little sin she would not add
to his punishment. "And what I propose to do is to make a complete
thing of it, this time. Of course," he went on convicting himself,
"I see that I shall inflict twice the pain that I should have done
if I had spoken frankly to him at first; and of course there will be
the added disappointment, and the expense of his coming to Boston.
But," he added brightly, "we can save him any expense while he's
here, and perhaps I can contrive to get him to go home this
afternoon."

"He wouldn't let you pay for his dinner out of the house anywhere,"
said Mrs. Sewell. "You must ask him to dinner here."

"Well," said Sewell, with resignation; and suspecting that his wife
was too much piqued or hurt by his former concealment to ask what he
now meant to do about Barker, he added: "I'm going to take him round
to a publisher and let him convince himself that there's no hope for
him in a literary way."

"David!" cried his wife; and now she left off adjusting the shams,