"did you know that my cousin Louis was tutor in your
uncle's family before the Sympsons came down here?"

Shirley's reply was not so prompt as her responses usually were, but at
last she answered, "Yes--of course; I knew it well."

"I thought you must have been aware of the circumstance."

"Well! what then?"

"It puzzles me to guess how it chanced that you never mentioned it to
me."

"Why should it puzzle you?"

"It seems odd. I cannot account for it. You talk a great deal--you talk
freely. How was that circumstance never touched on?"

"Because it never was," and Shirley laughed.

"You are a singular being!" observed her friend. "I thought I knew you
quite well; I begin to find myself mistaken. You were silent as the
grave about Mrs. Pryor, and now again here is another secret. But why
you made it a secret is the mystery to me."

"I never made it a secret; I had no reason for so doing. If you had
asked me who Henry's tutor was, I would have told you. Besides, I
thought you knew."

"I