He had written on the matter with a pleasant joke, like a gentleman as he was, disdaining to allude to the past passages in the life of her whom he loved, abstaining even from expressing anything that might be taken as a permission on his part.
There had been in Alice's words, as she told him of their proposed plan, a something that had betrayed a tremor in her thoughts.

She had studiously striven so to frame her phrases that her tale might be told as any other simple statement,--as though there had been no trembling in her mind as she wrote.

But she had failed, and she knew that she had failed.

She had failed; and he had read all her effort and all her failure.

She was quite conscious of this; she felt it thoroughly; and she knew that he was noble and a gentleman to the last drop of his blood.