I did not know my wonderful Margaret then." Wilbur kissed his wife's hands.

He was almost ridiculous, but it was horribly tragic for Margaret.
She longed as she had never longed for anything in her life, for the power to scream, to shout in his ears the truth, but she could not.
She was bound hard and fast in the bands of her own falsehood.

She could not so disgrace her husband, her children.

Why had she not thought of them before?
She had thought only of herself and her own glory, and that glory had turned to stinging bitterness upon her soul.

She was tasting the bitterest medicine which life and the whole world contains.