"You've told me a lot of what doesn't matter," she said sharply, after a pause, while she sipped her tea. "Now tell me something that does." She glanced down at the flashing diamond rings upon her fingers. "By your letter you have not escaped from those things you hoped to--when you left St. Ellis."
Joan started. She was sitting with her elbows on the table, her chin resting on her clasped hands. Mercy Lascelles observed the start, but offered no comment. She waited. She could afford to wait. She had read and understood the girl's letter. Besides, there was something else in her mind. Something else which required piecing into the web which linked their lives together. She knew that it held an important place, but its exact position her busy brain was still groping to resolve.
"Do you want me to talk about--those things?" the girl asked half appealingly. "Is it necessary? I am very happy, auntie, so happy that I don't want to risk losing a moment of it. I have not always been happy since I came here."
The hard, gray eyes suddenly lifted to the girl's face, and there was mocking in their depths.
"You mentioned them light-heartedly enough in your letter. You spoke of the death of two men to point your assurance that their death had nothing to do with your--fate. Some one had reassured you. Some one had made plain the absurdity that such a fate could ever be. Some one had shown you that such convictions only lived in the human mind and had no actual place in the scheme of things. Surely with this wonderful truth behind you, you need not shrink from details of things which have no connection with your life."
The icy sarcasm would not be denied. It was the old note Joan had been so familiar with. Its sting was as poignant as ever, but somehow now it stirred her to a defense of those who had come to her aid in her direst need.
But this was her aunt's first day on the farm. She felt she must restrain herself. She tried to smile, but it was a weakly attempt.
"You are quite unchanged, auntie," she said.
"I might say the same of you, Joan," came the sharp retort.
But Joan shook her head.
"You would be quite wrong. I have changed so much that you can never make me believe again in--all that which you made me believe before. Let me be frank. Nothing but my conviction that I am no more cursed by an evil fate than is every other living creature would have induced me to ask you here. I have asked you to come here and share my home because you are my aunt, my only relative, who has been good to me in the past. Because I am lonely here without you, and--and--oh, don't you understand? There are only us two left. Yes, I want to be with you." She broke off, but in a moment went on rapidly. "But this could never have been had I still believed what you made me believe. Under that old shadow I would have gone to the ends of the world rather than have been near you. Can't you understand? Let us forget it all--let us begin a new life together."