There was only one way out of the difficulty, and that was to make two homes one.

If she loved his brother, as he knew that his brother loved her, then-- "Rotha," said Ralph, with a perceptible tremulousness of voice, "I will ask you another question, and, perhaps--who knows rightly ?--perhaps it is harder for me to ask than for you to answer; but you will answer me--will you not ?--for I ask you solemnly and with the light of Heaven on my words--on the most earnest words, I think, that ever came out of my heart." He paused again.

Rotha sat on the end of the settle, and with fingers intertwined, with eyelids quivering and lips trembling, she gazed in silence into the fire.
"This is no time for idle vanities," he said; "it's no time to indulge unreal modesties; and you have none of either if it were.

God has laid His hand on us all, Rotha; yes, and our hearts are open without disguise before Him--and before each other, too, I think." "Yes," said Rotha.

She scarcely knew what to say, or whither Ralph's words tended.