The parting words had been spoken. Emily and her companion wereon their way to London.

For some little time, they traveled in silence--alone in therailway carriage. After submitting as long as she could to lay anembargo on the use of her tongue, Mrs. Ellmother started theconversation by means of a question: "Do you think Mr. Mirabelwill get over it, miss?"

"It's useless to ask me," Emily said. "Even the great man fromEdinburgh is not able to decide yet, whether he will recover ornot."

"You have taken me into your confidence, Miss Emily, as youpromised--and I have got something in my mind in consequence. MayI mention it without giving offense?"

"What is it?"

"I wish you had never taken up with Mr. Mirabel."

Emily was silent. Mrs. Ellmother, having a design of her own toaccomplish, ventured to speak more plainly. "I often think of Mr.Alban Morris," she proceeded. "I always did like him, and Ialways shall."

Emily suddenly pulled down her veil. "Don't speak of him!" shesaid.

"I didn't mean to offend you."

"You don't offend me. You distress me. Oh, how often I havewished--!" She threw herself back in a corner of the carriage andsaid no more.

Although not remarkable for the possession of delicate tact, Mrs.Ellmother discovered that the best course she could now followwas a course of silence.

Even at the time when she had most implicitly trusted Mirabel,the fear that she might have acted hastily and harshly towardAlban had occasionally troubled Emily's mind. The impressionproduced by later events had not only intensified this feeling,but had presented the motives of that true friend under anentirely new point of view. If she had been left in ignorance ofthe manner of her father's death--as Alban had designed to leaveher; as she would have been left, but for the treachery ofFrancine--how happily free she would have been from thoughtswhich it was now a terror to her to recall. She would have partedfrom Mirabel, when the visit to the pleasant country house hadcome to an end, remembering him as an amusing acquaintance andnothing more. He would have been spared, and she would have beenspared, the shock that had so cruelly assailed them both. Whathad she gained by Mrs. Rook's detestable confession? The resulthad been perpetual disturbance of mind provoked by self-torturingspeculations on the subject of the murder. If Mirabel wasinnocent, who was guilty? The false wife, without pity andwithout shame--or the brutal husband, who looked capable of anyenormity? What was her future to be? How was it all to end? Inthe despair of that bitter moment--seeing her devoted old servantlooking at her with kind compassionate eyes--Emily's troubledspirit sought refuge in impetuous self-betrayal; the verybetrayal which she had resolved should not escape her, hardly aminute since!

She bent forward out of her corner, and suddenly drew up herveil. "Do you expect to see Mr. Alban Morris, when we get back?"she asked.

"I should like to see him, miss--if you have no objection."

"Tell him I am ashamed of myself! and say I ask his pardon withall my heart!"

"The Lord be praised!" Mrs. Ellmother burst out--and then, whenit was too late, remembered the conventional restraintsappropriate to the occasion. "Gracious, what a fool I am!" shesaid to herself. "Beautiful weather, Miss Emily, isn't it?" shecontinued, in a desperate hurry to change the subject.

Emily reclined again in her corner of the carriage. She smiled,for the first time since she had become Mrs. Delvin's guest atthe tower.