"I couldn't imagine how you would take it." "It all depends.

Who is the man ?" Still shrinking towards a position where Hilliard could not easily observe her, the young widow told her story.

She had consented to marry a man of whom her brother-in-law knew little but the name, one Ezra Marr; he was turned forty, a widower without children, and belonged to a class of small employers of labour known in Birmingham as "little masters." The contrast between such a man and Maurice Hilliard's brother was sufficiently pronounced; but the widow nervously did her best to show Ezra Marr in a favourable light.
"And then," she added after a pause, while Hilliard was reflecting, "I couldn't go on being a burden on you.

How very few men would have done what you have----" "Stop a minute.

Is _that_ the real reason?
If so----" Hurriedly she interposed.
"That was only one of the reasons--only one." Hilliard knew very well that her marriage had not been entirely successful; it seemed to him very probable that with a husband of the artisan class, a vigorous and go-ahead fellow, she would be better mated than in the former instance.