"Robert--my Robert!" Mrs. Gorham's voice was low but masterful in the force which lay behind the words. "Nothing can ever come to me so bitter as to make me forget that this has caused you to say what you have just said. You mean every word, and to have won such devotion from such a man is enough to make any woman's life complete. But it is your heart which speaks, and our sober judgment must acknowledge without a question the necessity of settling beyond the reach of doubt the validity of the legal tie which binds us. We need no court to settle the question of our love, my Robert--that is the real marriage which I know God only recognizes; but there can be no happiness for us if we disregard even for a moment those conventions which are necessary to our every-day life. You know it, dear, just as I do."
"It is unnecessary, Eleanor--it is unwise. We are so certain that there is no real basis for doubt."
"Would you feel the same if Alice were involved?" she asked, quietly.
"Yes; suppose this same question came up with her, would you not be the first to insist that the facts be proven?"
"What can I say?" he asked, brokenly. "This means a public trial and all the scandal that goes with it. It means a rehearsing of all that past which I have tried to help you to forget. It means pain and sorrow and suffering to you, dear--to you whom I would shield with my life from just what now threatens you."
"A trial, Robert?" Mrs. Gorham asked, looking at him with a startled expression. "Do you mean that there has to be a trial?"
"Of course," Gorham replied, wondering at the unexpected change in her attitude.
Suddenly she buried her face against his shoulder and burst into tears. "Oh, I couldn't stand that!" she cried.
Gorham gently held her face from him and looked into it kindly but questioningly. "Why not?" he asked.
"It would kill me," she replied, not meeting his look.
"Is there anything which the trial could bring out which you have not already told me, Eleanor?" he asked, quietly.
"Don't you know enough already to understand why I could never live through it?"
Gorham urged no further and caressed her gently, yet there was an expression of distinct disappointment in his face.
"There must be no trial," he said, firmly. "You shall be shielded from that and from everything else which threatens to bring you sorrow. You must leave it all in my hands."