"You must reflect then that your denunciation can only strike me as, for
all its violence, vague and unconvincing. Never had a girl less the
appearance of bearing such charges out. You know how I've admired her."

"You know nothing about her! _I_ do, you see, for she's the work of my
hand!" And Mrs. Pallant laughed for bitterness. "I've watched her for
years, and little by little, for the last two or three, it has come over
me. There's not a tender spot in her whole composition. To arrive at a
brilliant social position, if it were necessary, she would see me drown
in this lake without lifting a finger, she would stand there and see it
--she would push me in--and never feel a pang. That's my young lady!" Her
lucidity chilled me to the soul--it seemed to shine so flawless. "To
climb up to the top and be splendid and envied there," she went on--"to
do that at any cost or by any meanness and cruelty is the only thing she
has a heart for. She'd lie for it, she'd steal for it, she'd kill for
it!" My companion brought out these words with a cold confidence that
had evidently behind it some occult past process of growth. I watched
her pale face and glowing eyes; she held me breathless and frowning, but
her strange vindictive, or at least retributive, passion irresistibly
imposed itself. I found myself at last believing her, pitying her more
than I pitied the subject of her dreadful analysis. It was as if she had
held her tongue for longer than she could bear, suffering more and more
the importunity of the truth. It relieved her thus to drag that to the
light, and still she kept up the high and most unholy sacrifice. "God in
his mercy has let me see it in time, but his ways are strange that he
has let me see it in my daughter. It's myself he has let me see--myself
as I was for years. But she's worse--she IS, I assure you; she's worse
than I intended or dreamed." Her hands were clasped tightly together in
her lap; her low voice quavered and her breath came short; she looked up