Page:The New Penelope.djvu/48

 She has given me one, I know,' said Mr. Seabrook, regarding me curiously. I began to feel faint, and sat down, leaning my head on my hand, my elbow on the table.

Anna,' said he, addressing me by my Christian name for the first time, and giving me a little shock in consequence—for I had almost forgotten I had ever been called 'Anna'—'if I am so disagreeable to you, I will go away again; though I certainly had reason to expect a different reception.'

No,' I said, suddenly rousing up; 'you must not go until I have told you something; unless you go to stay—which would perhaps be best.'

To stay! go to stay? There seems great need of explanation here. Will you be good enough to tell me why I am to go away to stay?'

The reason is, Mr. Seabrook,' I answered, 'that your true wife, and your own children expect you at home, in Ohio.'

"I had worded my answer with the intention of shocking the truth out of him, if possible. If he should be innocent, I thought, he would forgive me. There was too much at stake to stand upon niceties of speech; and I watched him narrowly."

"How did he receive such a blow as that? I am curious to know how guilty people act, on being accused."

"You cannot tell an innocent from a guilty person," Mrs. Greyfield returned, with a touch of that asperity that was sometimes noticeable in her utterances. Then, more quietly: "Both are shocked alike at being accused; one because he is innocent; the other, because he is guilty. How much a person is shocked depends upon temperament and circumstance. The guilty person, always consciously in danger of being accused, is likely to be prepared and on the defensive, while the other is not.

"What Mr. Seabrook did, was to turn upon me a look