"What need is there to tell such fearful stories?" asked Clementina, slowly. "Why cannot people let such things die out of remembrance altogether, instead of keeping them alive by constant repetition?"
"It is hard to let a story die," Sir James answered. "If it is good, you want to tell it for its pleasantness; and if it is a tragedy, we are all so naturally dramatic that we cannot forego the excitement. That sad story of poor Miss Arthur's sister will never be forgotten, because it is such a real tragedy—such a not revolting and yet thrilling horror."
"Did Miss Arthur have any conversation with you?" asked Mrs. Kinniside, stirring her tea, and speaking in a set, hard voice. "Do you know her, by-the-bye?"
"No, I do not; I was not presented to her, and so I did not talk to her. She spoke to very few people, so far as I could see, and seemed to shun all notice whatever."
Mrs. Kinniside wiped her lips. They were white and trembling, and the upper hp was beaded with moisture.
"How long ago was it?" asked Bessie.
"Just five years," replied Sir James.
"Poor thing!—how shocking!" murmured the girl. "I wonder if she was in love with any one!"
"She was engaged, I believe; but I do not know to whom. Why! Mrs. Kinniside, what on earth is the matter with you?" cried the young man, leaning across the table to take the lady's hand.
"Nothing, dear Sir James, it is nothing," she said, faintly; "only an old pain I sometimes have through my heart — nothing, I assure you!"
"I thought you were going to faint," said Sir James. "You looked quite ghastly!"
She smiled, as if with a spasmodic effort, and the conversation dropped. But the pleasure of the evening was at an end. Mrs. Kinniside was forced, unnatural, feverish, and restless in her manner; and Clementina was stiller and colder than ever, with a look half-bewildered and half-desperate in her large, fixed eyes, into which came every now and then an expression of almost terror if she glanced at her mother or Sir James. Something was evidently sadly wrong and out of gear; but what it was no one exactly knew, save Mrs. Kinniside; and with her it was a matter of life and death to conceal what she knew—whatever that might be. So Sir James took his leave early, and Mrs. Kinniside felt as if a nightmare was lifted from her heart when his last good night was said.
"Mamma," said Clementina, suddenly, as they were going to bed—for they slept together, that being one of Mrs. Kinniside's "fads," as the servants called them, not to let her daughter be much alone. "Mamma, tell me what connection this story of Miss Arthur has with us or you."
"What do you mean, child?" replied the mother, startled out of her usual constrained and artificial self, and turning on her a face of horror.
"I mean just what I say," returned Clementina, quietly. "You have a secret which you have kept from me all our lives, and I want to know what it is—I must know, and will." She drew a chair to the foot of the bed, where she had been standing, and, half undressed as she was, sat down in it, with a fixed resoluteness her mother had never seen in her before.
"This is a manner and language I cannot permit you to use toward me, Clementina," replied Mrs. Kinniside, with cold dignity.
