I had quite forgotten him until to-night." Arkwright was staring at her.

Her perfect frankness, absolute naturalness with him, unreserved trust of him, gave him a guilty feeling for the bitter judgment on her character which he had secretly formed as the result of her confidences.

"Yet, really," thought he, "she's quite the nicest girl I know, and the cleverest.

If she had hid herself from me, as the rest do, I'd never for one instant have suspected her of having so much--so much--calm, good sense--for that's all it amounts to." He decided it was a mistake for any human being in any circumstances to be absolutely natural and unconcealingly candid.

"We're such shallow fakers," reflected he, "that if any one confesses to us things not a tenth part as bad as what we privately think and do, why, we set him--or her--especially her--down as a living, breathing atrocity in pants or petticoats." Margaret was of the women who seem never to think of what they are really absorbed in, and never to look at what they are really scrutinizing.