Then she slipped out of the room, and left the two friends together.
They both sat down again; this time side by side, and Mrs.Costello told in few words as much of her story as was needful.

She dwelt, however, so lightly on the sufferings of her life at Moose Island that any one, who had known or loved her less than Mrs.Bellairs did, might have thought she had fled with too little reason from the ties she was now so anxious to resume.

She spoke very shortly, too, of the fears she had had during the past summer of some discovery, and mentioned having told Lucia her true history, without any allusion to the particular time when it was told.

Mrs.Bellairs recollected the meeting with the squaw at the farm, and inquired whether Lucia then knew of her Indian descent.
"No," Mrs.Costello said, "that was one of the things which alarmed me.
I did not tell her till some time after that; not, indeed, until after Bella's marriage." "Poor child! and then for this terrible trouble to come! No wonder you are both changed." "Do you think _her_ changed ?" Mrs.Costello asked in alarm.

"She has been so brave." "She has grown to look much older and as if she thought too much; that is all.