In the old days there had been a sort of antagonism between Bella Latour and Maurice Leigh.

They had necessarily seen a great deal of each other, and liked each other after a certain fashion; but Maurice had thought Bella too flighty, and inclined to fastness; and Bella had been half-seriously, half-playfully disposed to resent his judgment of her.
But now, either because of the complete change in her character which the last few months had wrought, or from some other cause, Mrs.Morton and Maurice fell into a kind of confidential intimacy quite new to their intercourse.

It was only for two days, certainly, but during those two days, and in spite of Maurice's occupations, they had time for several long and very interesting conversations.
In the first of these, which had begun upon some indifferent subject, Bella surprised Maurice by alluding, quite calmly and simply, to the imprisonment of the unfortunate Indian, Lucia's father.

He had naturally supposed that a subject so closely connected with her own misfortunes would have been too deeply painful to be a permitted one, and had, therefore, with care, avoided all allusion to it.

In this, however, he did not do her full justice.