“Ought I not to be glad to do so, if I could: though it were only for my own sake?”
“Truly,” returned Bella, “it must try you very much, and—you must please promise me that you won’t take ill what I am going to add, Mr. Rokesmith?”
“I promise it with all my heart.”
“—And it must sometimes, I should think,” said Bella, hesitating, “a little lower you in your own estimation?”
Assenting with a movement of his head, though not at all looking as if it did, the Secretary replied:
“I have very strong reasons, Miss Wilfer, for bearing with the drawbacks of my position in the house we both inhabit. Believe that they are not all mercenary, although I have, through a series of strange fatalities, faded out of my place in life. If what you see with