The bitterest moment she had felt yet was the moment in which he raised her hand to his lips, and murmured tenderly, "My own true Grace!" She could only sign to him to leave her, and hurry back into her own room.
Her first feeling, when she found herself alone again, was wonder--wonder that it should never have occurred to her, until he had himself suggested it, that her betrothed husband had the foremost right to her confession.

Her horror at owning to either of them that she had cheated them out of their love had hitherto placed Horace and Lady Janet on the same level.

She now saw for the first time that there was no comparison between the claims which they respectively had on her.

She owned an allegiance to Horace to which Lady Janet could assert no right.
Cost her what it might to avow the truth to him with her own lips, the cruel sacrifice must be made.
Without a moment's hesitation she put away her writing materials.

It amazed her that she should ever have thought of using Julian Gray as an interpreter between the man to whom she was betrothed and herself.
Julian's sympathy (she thought) must have made a strong impression on her indeed to blind her to a duty which was beyond all compromise, which admitted of no dispute! She had asked for five minutes of delay before she followed Horace.