In deep astonishment and still deeper mortification, I pursue my way in silence.
Suddenly Roger comes to a stand-still.
"Nancy!" he says, in a voice that is more like his own, stopping and laying his hands on my shoulders; while in his eyes is something of his old kindness; yet not quite the old kindness either; there is more of unwilling, rueful yearning in them than there ever was in that--"Nancy, how old are you ?--nineteen, is it not ?" "Very nearly twenty," reply I, cheerfully, for he has called me "Nancy," and I hail it as a sign of returning fine weather; "we may call it twenty; will not it be a comfort when I am well out of my teens ?" "And I am forty-eight," he says, as if speaking more to himself than to me, and sighing heavily; "it is a _monstrous_, an _unnatural_ disparity!" "It is not nearly so bad as if it were _the other way_," reply I, laughing gayly; "I forty-eight, and _you_ twenty, is it ?" "My child! my child!"-- speaking with an accent of, to me, unaccountable suffering--"what possessed me to _marry_ you?
why did not I _adopt_ you instead?
It would have been a hundred times more seemly!" "It is a little late to think of that now, is not it ?" I say, with an uncomfortable smile; then I go on, with an uneasy laugh, "that was the very idea that occurred to us the first night you arrived; at least, it never struck us as possible that you would take any notice of _me_, but we all said what a good thing it would be for the family if you would adopt Barbara or the Brat." "Did you ?" (very quickly, in a tone of keen pain); "it struck you all in the same light then ?" "But that was before we had seen you," I answer, hastily, repenting my confession as soon as I see its effects.

"When we _had_, we soon changed our tune." "_If_ I _had_ adopted you," he pursues, still looking at me with the same painful and intent wistfulness, "if I had been your father, you would have been fond of me, would not you?
Not _afraid_ of me--not afraid to tell me any thing that most nearly concerned you--you would perhaps"-- (with a difficult smile)--"you would perhaps have made me your _confidant_, would you, Nancy ?" I look up at him in utter bewilderment.
"What are you talking about?
Why do I want a confidant?
What have I to confide?
What have I to tell any one ?" Our eyes are resting on each other, and, as I speak, I feel his go with clean and piercing search right through mine into my soul.

In a moment I think of Musgrave, and the untold black tale now forever in my thought attached to him, and, as I so think, the hot flush of agonized shame that the recollection of him never fails to call to my face, invades cheeks, brow, and throat.

To hide it, I drop my head on Roger's breast.
Shall I tell him _now_, this instant?
Is it possible that he has already some faint and shadowy suspicion of the truth--some vague conjecture concerning it, as something in his manner seems to say?
But no! it is absolutely impossible! Who, with the best will in the world, could have told him?
Is not the tale safely buried in the deep grave of Musgrave's and my two hearts?
I raise my head, and twice essay to speak.

Twice I stop, choked.