hitting a man when he is down. But I call it very unkind and unjust, and I did think that an old friend like you would be above it. It hurts Conrad dreadfully to find you so cold to him. I should have thought you would have liked to help him to recover the ground he had lost.” [210] [211] “That can hardly be my office now,” said Monica, gravely. “But at least you need not be unkind. I do assure you the poor boy has gone through quite enough, as it is.” “You have told me the whole truth about his past, Cecilia?” asked Monica, after a brief silence. “There is nothing worse you are keeping back?” Mrs. Bellamy clasped her hands together with a little gesture of astonished dismay. “Is not forgery bad enough for you, [212]Monica? What has your husband been telling you? Did you think he had committed a murder?” [212] Monica left Mrs. Bellamy’s presence somewhat relieved in mind. She was glad to know the secret of Conrad’s past, the cause of her husband’s disdain and distrust of the man. It was natural, she thought, that Randolph, as a friend of Colonel Hamilton’s, should feel deep indignation at the ingratitude and treachery of the fraud, and yet she felt a sort of relief that it was nothing blacker and baser. She had begun to have an undefined feeling, since she had entered somewhat into the tumultuous life of the great world, that there were depths of folly and sin and crime beneath its smooth, polished surface, of whose very existence she had never dreamed before. [213] [213] When she returned home that day, and said from whose house she had just come, she fancied a shade gathered on her husband’s brow. “Do you not go there rather often, Monica?” “We were friends as children,” she said. “Am I to give up everything that seems connected with the past—with my home?” “I lay no embargo upon you, Monica,” he said; “or at least only one: I cannot permit Sir Conrad Fitzgerald to visit my wife, nor enter my house. If his sister is your friend, and you wish to continue the friendship, I say nothing against it. You shall be the judge whether or not you visit at a house your husband cannot enter, and
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