Page:The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (emended first edition), Volume 1.djvu/275

Rh "And how much of our conversation did you hear?"

"I heard quite enough, Helen. And it was well for me that I did hear it; for nothing less could have cured my infatuation. I always said and thought, that I would never believe a word against you, unless I heard it from your own lips. All the hints and affirmations of others I treated as malignant, baseless slanders; your own self accusations I believed to be overstrained; and all that seemed unaccountable in your position, I trusted that you could account for if you chose."

Mrs. Graham had discontinued her walk. She leant against one end of the chimneypiece, opposite that near which I was standing, with her chin resting on her closed hand, her eyes—no longer burning with anger, but gleaming with restless excitement—sometimes glancing at me while I spoke, then coursing the opposite wall, or fixed upon the carpet.

"You should have come to me, after all,"