“Let me see it!”

She showed me the marks. I was past grieving over them, past crying over them, past shuddering over them. They say we are either better than men, or worse. If the temptation that has fallen in some women’s way, and made them worse, had fallen in mine at that moment⁠—Thank God! my face betrayed nothing that his wife could read. The gentle, innocent, affectionate creature thought I was frightened for her and sorry for her, and thought no more.

“Don’t think too seriously of it, Marian,” she said simply, as she pulled her sleeve down again. “It doesn’t hurt me now.”

“I will try to think quietly of it, my love, for your sake.⁠—Well! well! And you told him all that Anne Catherick had said to you⁠—all that you told me?”

“Yes, all. He insisted on it⁠—I was alone with him⁠—I could conceal nothing.”

“Did he say anything when you had done?”