Then the elder woman’s face flushed a burning red, and she knew at once what the girl had suspected.  “You might proclaim it on the house-tops if it would please you,” she cried out, vehemently.  “If you think—­if you think—­”

“Oh, I do not!” cried Ellen, in an agony of pleading.  “Indeed, I do not.  It was only that—­I—­feared lest you might think I would be mean enough to tell.”

“I would have told, myself, long ago if there had been only myself to consider,” said Cynthia, still red with anger, and her voice strained.  All at once she seemed to Ellen more like the woman of her childhood.  “Yes, I would,” said she, hotly—­“I will now.”

“Oh, I beg you not!” cried Ellen.

“I will go with you this minute and tell your mother,” Cynthia said, rising.

Ellen sprang up and moved towards her as if to push her back in her chair.  “Oh, please don’t!” she cried.  “Please don’t.  You don’t know mother; and it would do no good.  It was only because I wondered if you could have thought I would tell, if I would be so mean.”

“And you thought, perhaps, I was bribing you not to tell, with Vassar College,” Cynthia said, suddenly.  “Well, you have suspected me of something which was undeserved.”

“I am very sorry,” Ellen said.  “I did not suspect, really, but I do not know why you do this for me.”  She said the last with her steady eyes of interrogation on Cynthia’s face.

“You know the reasons I have given.”

“I do not think they were the only ones,” Ellen replied, stoutly.  “I do not think my valedictory was so good as to warrant so much, and I do not think I am so smart as to warrant so much, either.”

Cynthia laughed.  She sat down again.  “Well,” she said, “you are not one to swallow praise greedily.”  Then her tone changed.  “I owe it to you to tell you why I wish to do this,” she said, “and I will.  You are an honest girl, with yourself as well as with other people—­too honest, perhaps, and you deserve that I should be honest with you.  I am not doing this for you in the least, my dear.”

Ellen stared at her.

“No, I am not,” repeated Cynthia.  “You are a very clever, smart girl, I am sure, and it will be a nice thing for you to have a better education, and be able to take a higher place in the world, but I am not doing it for you.  When you were a little child I would have done everything, given my life almost, for you, but I never care so much for children when they grow up.  I am not doing this for you, but for your mother.”

“My mother?” said Ellen.

“Yes, your mother.  I know what agony your mother must have been in, that time when I kept you, and I want to atone in some way.  I think this is a good way.  I don’t think you need to hesitate about letting me do it.  You also owe a little atonement to your mother.  It was not right for you to run away, in the first place.”

“Yes, I was very naughty to run away,” Ellen said, starting.  She rose, and held out her hand.  “I hope you will forgive me,” she said.  “I am very grateful, and it will make my father and mother happier than anything else could, but indeed I don’t think—­it is so long ago—­that there was any need—­”