"I was thinking how comfortable it is here," Philip said at length.
"And that made you sigh?"
"Yes; I'm ashamed to say that it came over me how far away from me all
this is."
"If it is," she returned slowly, "it is simply because you choose that
it shall be."
He turned his face toward her as if about to protest; then looked
again into the fire. The conversation seemed ended, until Mrs. Herman
spoke again as if nothing had been said.
"You have been slumming this afternoon?"
"I do not like the name, but I suppose I have."
"It isn't a cheerful day to go poking about alone among the tenement
houses."
"I was not alone," Ashe answered with a hesitation which she could not
help noting and with a significant softening of voice. "Mrs. Fenton was
with me."
"Ah!"
The exclamation was involuntary. In an instant there had flashed upon
Helen's mind a suspicion of the true state of things. The despondency
of her cousin, the reflection upon the comfort of domesticity,
connected themselves in her thought with trifling incidents which had
before come under her observation; and his manner of speaking brought
instantly to her mind the conviction that Ashe was thinking of Mrs.
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