CHAPTER XIX.
POLITIC REPENTANCE Perhaps no one--not even Mrs.Merrick--was so unhappy in consequence of the lamentable crime that had been committed as Diana Von Taer.
Immediately after her interview with Beth her mood changed, and she would have given worlds to be free from complicity in the abduction.
Bitterly, indeed, she reproached herself for her enmity toward the unsuspecting girl, an innocent victim of Diana's own vain desires and Charles Mershone's heartless wiles.

Repenting her folly and reasoning out the thing when it was too late, Diana saw clearly that she had gained no possible advantage, but had thoughtlessly conspired to ruin the reputation of an honest, ingenuous girl.
Not long ago she had said that her life was dull, a stupid round of social functions that bored her dreadfully.

She had hoped by adopting John Merrick's nieces as her _protegees_ and introducing them to society to find a novel and pleasurable excitement that would serve to take her out of her unfortunate _ennui_--a condition to which she had practically been born.
But Diana had never bargained for such excitement as this; she had never thought to win self abhorrence by acts of petty malice and callous cruelties.

Yet so intrenched was she in the conservatism of her class that she could not at once bring herself to the point of exposing her own guilt that she might make amends for what had been done.

She told herself she would rather die than permit Louise to suffer through her connivance with her reckless, unprincipled cousin.