"There's nothing wrong with anyone? There hasn't been an accident or anything?"
The other, still speechless, conveyed "No."
"Don't," said Betty again. And slowly and very artistically the flood was abated. Lady St. Craye was almost calm, though still her breath caught now and then in little broken sighs.
"I am so sorry," she said, "so ashamed.--Breaking down like this. You don't know what it is to be as unhappy as I am."
Betty thought she did. We all think we do, in the presence of any grief not our own.
"Can I do anything?" She spoke much more kindly than she had expected to speak.
"Will you let me tell you everything? The whole truth?"
"Of course if you want to, but--"
"Then do sit down--and oh, don't be angry with me, I am so wretched. Just now you thought something had happened to Mr. Vernon. Will you just tell me one thing?--Do you love him?"
"You've no right to ask me that."
"I know I haven't. Well, I'll trust you--though you don't trust me. I'll tell you everything. Two years ago Mr. Vernon and I were engaged."
This was not true; but it took less time to tell than the truth would have taken, and sounded better.
"We were engaged, and I was very fond of him. But he--you know what he is about Women?"
"No," said Betty steadily. "I don't want to hear anything about him."
"But you must.--He is--I don't know how to put it. There's always some woman besides the One with him. I understand that now; I didn't then. I don't think he can help it. It's his temperament."
"I see," said Betty evenly. Her hands and feet were very cold. She was astonished to find how little moved she was in this interview whose end she foresaw so very plainly.
"Yes, and there was a girl at that time--he was always about with her. And I made him scenes--always a most stupid thing to do with a man, you know; and at last I said he must give her up, or give me up. And he gave me up. And I was too proud to let him think I cared--and just to show him how little I cared I married Sir Harry St. Craye. I might just as well have let it alone. He never even heard I had been married till last October! And then it was I who told him. My husband was a brute, and I'm thankful to say he didn't live long. You're very much shocked, I'm afraid?"