"Damn you!" said Sir Eustace.

With the words he shifted his grasp, took Scott by the collar, and swung him round.

"Then you may also tell her," he said, his voice low and furious, "that you have had the kicking that a little yapping cur like you deserves."

He kicked him with the words, kicked him thrice, and flung him brutally aside.

Scott went down, grabbing vainly at the bed to save himself. His face was deathly as he turned it, but he said nothing. He had said his say.

Sir Eustace was white also, white and terrible, with eyes of flame. He stood a moment, glaring down at him. Then, as though he could not trust himself, wheeled and strode to the door.

"And when you've done," he said, "you can come to me for another, you beastly little cad!"

He went, leaving the door wide behind him. His feet resounded along the passage and died away. The distant waltz-music came softly in. And Scott pulled himself painfully up and sat on the end of the bed, panting heavily.

Minutes passed ere he moved. Then at last very slowly he got up. He had recovered his breath. His mouth was firm, his eyes resolute and indomitable, his whole bearing composed, as with that dignity that Dinah had so often remarked in him he limped to the door and passed out, closing it quietly behind him.

The dance-music was still floating through the passages with a mocking allurement. The tramp of feet and laughter of many voices rose with it. A flicker of irony passed over his drawn face. He straightened his collar with absolute steadiness, and moved away in the direction of his own room.



CHAPTER XXIX

THE CAPTIVE

Isabel uttered no reproaches to her charge as, quivering with shame, she returned from her escapade. She exchanged no more than a low "Good night!" with Scott, and then turned back into the room with Dinah. But as the latter stood before her, crest-fallen and humiliated, expecting a reprimand, she only laid very gentle hands upon her and began to unfasten her dress.

"I wasn't spying upon you, dear child," she said. "I only looked in to see if you would care for a cup of milk last thing."

That broke Dinah utterly and overwhelmingly. In her contrition, she cast herself literally at Isabel's feet. "Oh, what a beast I am! What a beast!" she sobbed. "Will you ever forgive me? I shall never forgive myself!"

Isabel was very tender with her, checking her wild outburst with loving words. She asked no question as to what had been happening, for which forbearance Dinah's gratitude was great even though it served to intensify her remorse. With all a mother's loving care she soothed her, assuring her of complete forgiveness and understanding.

"I did wild things in my own girlhood," she said. "I know what it means, dear, when temptation comes."

And so at last she calmed her agitation, and helped her to bed, waiting upon her with the utmost gentleness, saying no word of blame or even of admonition.

Not till she had gone, did it dawn upon Dinah that this task had probably been left to Scott, and with the thought a great dread of the morrow came upon her. Though he had betrayed no hint of displeasure, she felt convinced that she had incurred it; and all her new-born shyness in his presence, returned upon her a thousandfold. She did not know how she would face him when the morning came.

He would not be angry she knew. He would not scold her like Colonel de Vigne. But yet she shrank from the thought of his disappointment in her as she had never before shrunk from the Colonel's rebuke. She was sure that she had forfeited his good opinion for ever, and many and bitter were the tears that she shed over her loss.

Her thoughts of Eustace were of too confused a nature to be put into coherent form. The moment they turned in his direction her brain became a flashing whirl in which doubts, fears, and terrible ectasies ran wild riot. She lay and trembled at the memory of his strength, exulting almost in the same moment that he had stooped with such mastery to possess her. His magnificence dazzled her, deprived her of all powers of rational judgment. She only realized that she—and she alone—had been singled out of the crowd for that fiery worship; and it seemed to her that she had been created for that one splendid purpose.

But always the memory of Scott shot her triumph through with a regret so poignant as to deprive it of all lasting rapture. She had hurt him, she had disappointed him; she did not know how she would ever look him in the eyes again.

Her sleep throughout that last night was broken and unrefreshing, and ever the haunting strains of Simple Aveu pulsed through her brain like a low voice calling her perpetually, refusing to be stilled. Only one night more and she would be back in her home; this glittering, Alpine dream would be over, never to return. And again she turned on her pillow and wept. It was so hard, so hard, to go back.

In the morning she arose white-faced and weary, with dark shadows under her eyes, and a head that throbbed tormentingly. She breakfasted with Isabel in the latter's room, and was again deeply grateful to her friend for forbearing to comment upon her subdued manner. She could not make any pretence at cheerfulness that day, being in fact still so near to tears that she could scarcely keep from breaking down.

"Don't wait for me, dear!" Isabel said gently at length. "I see you are not hungry. We are taking some provisions with us; perhaps you will feel more like eating presently."

Dinah escaped very thankfully and returned to her own room.

Here she remained for awhile till more sure of herself; then Biddy came in to finish her packing and she slipped away to avoid the old woman's shrewd observation. She feared to go downstairs lest she should meet Scott; but presently, as she hovered in the passage, she heard his halting tread in the main corridor.

He was evidently on his way to his sister's room, and seizing her opportunity, she ran like a hare in the opposite direction and managed to slip downstairs without adventure.

She was not to escape unnoticed, however. The first person she encountered in the vestibule came forward instantly at sight of her with the promptitude of one who has been lying in wait.

She recoiled with a gasp, but she could not run away. She was caught as surely as she had been the night before.

"Hullo!" smiled Sir Eustace, with extended hand. "Going out for a last look round? May I come too?"

She felt the dominance of his grip. It was coolly, imperially possessive. To answer his request seemed superfluous, even bordering upon presumption. It was obvious that he had every intention of accompanying her.

She gave a confused murmur of assent, and they passed through the vestibule side by side. She was conscious of curious glances from several strangers who were standing about, and Eustace exchanged a few words with a species of regal condescension here and there as they went. And then they were out in the pure sunlight of the mountains, alone for the last time in their paradise of snow.

Almost instinctively Dinah turned up the winding track. They had half an hour before them, and she felt she could not bear to stand still. He strolled beside her, idly smoking, not troubling to make conversation, now as ever sublimely at his ease.

The snow sparkled around them like a thousand gems Dinah's eyes were burning and smarting with the brightness. And still that tender waltz-music ran lilting through her brain, drifting as it were through the mist of her unshed tears.

Suddenly he spoke. They were nearing the pine-wood and quite alone. "Is there anything the matter?"

She choked down a great lump in her throat before she could speak in answer. "No," she murmured then. "I—I am just—rather low about leaving; that's all."

"Quite all?" he said.

His tone was so casual, so normal, that it seemed impossible now to think of last night's happening save as an extravagant dream. She almost felt for the moment as if she had imagined it all. And then he spoke again, and she caught a subtle note of tenderness in his voice that brought it all back upon her in an overwhelming rush.

"That's really all, is it? You're not unhappy about anything else? Scott hasn't been bullying you?"

She gasped at the question. "Oh no! Oh no! He wouldn't! He couldn't! I—haven't even seen him today."

He received the information in silence; but in a moment or two he tossed away his cigarette with the air of a man having come to an abrupt resolution.

"And so you're fretting about going home?" he said.

She nodded mutely. The matter would not bear discussion.

"Poor little Daphne!" he said. "It's been a good game, hasn't it?"

She nodded again. "Just like the dreams that never come true," she managed to say.

"Would you like it to come true?" he asked her unexpectedly.

She glanced up at him with a woeful little smile. "It's no good thinking of that, is it?" she said.

"I have an idea we could make it come true between us," he said.

She shook her head. That brief glimpse of his intent eyes had sent a sudden and overwhelming wave of shyness through her. She remembered again the fiery holding of his arms, and was afraid.

He paused in his walk and turned aside to the railing that bounded the side of the track above the steep, pine-covered descent. "Wish hard enough," he said, "and all dreams come true!"

Dinah went with him as if compelled. She leaned against the railing, glad of the support, while he sat down upon it. His attitude was supremely easy and self-possessed.

"Do you know, Daphne," he said, "I've taken a fancy to that particular dream myself? Now I've caught you, I don't see myself letting you go again."

Her heart throbbed at his words. She bent her head, fixing her eyes upon the rough wood upon which she leaned.

"But it's no good, is it?" she said, almost below her breath. "I've just got to go."

He put his hand on her shoulder, and she was conscious afresh of the electricity of his touch. She shrank a little—a very little; for she was frightened, albeit curiously aware of a magnetism that drew her irresistibly.

"Yes, I suppose you've got to go," he said. "But—there's nothing to prevent me following you, is there?"

She quivered from head to foot. That hand upon her shoulder sent such a tumult of emotions through her that she could not collect her thoughts in any coherent order. "I—I don't know," she whispered, bending her head still lower. "They—I don't know what they would say at home."

"Your people?" His hand was drawing her now with an insistent pressure that would not be denied. "They'd probably dance on their heads with delight," he said, his tone one of slightly supercilious humour. "I assure you I am considered something of a catch by a good many anxious mammas."

She started at that, started and straightened herself, lifting shy eyes to his. "Oh, but we've only been—playing," she said rather uncertainly. "Just—just pretending to flirt, that's all."

He laughed, bending his handsome, imperious face to hers. "It's been a fairly solid pretence, hasn't it?" he said. "But I'm proposing something slightly different now. I'm offering you my hand—as well as my heart."

Dinah was trembling all over. She gasped for breath, drawing back slightly from the nearness of his lips. "Do you mean—you'd like—to marry me?" she whispered tremulously, and hid her face on the instant; for the bald words sounded preposterous.

He laughed again, softly, half-mockingly, and drew her into his arms. "Whatever made you think of that, my elf of the mountains? I'll vow it came into your head first. Ah, you needn't hide your eyes from me. I know you're mine—all mine. I've known it from the first—ever since you began to run away. But I've caught you now. Haven't I? Haven't I?"

She clung to him desperately. It seemed the only way; for she was for the moment swept off her feet, terribly afraid of arousing that storm of passion which had so overwhelmed her the night before. Instinct warned her what to expect if she attempted to withdraw herself. Moreover, the tumult of her feeling was such that she did not want to do so. She wanted only to hide her head for a space, and be still.

He pressed her close, still laughing at her shyness. "What a good thing I'm not shy!" he said. "If I were, to-day would be the end of everything instead of the beginning. Can't you bring yourself to look at your new possession? Did you think you could laugh and run away for all time?"

Then, as in muffled accents she besought him to be patient with her, he softened magically and for the first time spoke of love.

"Don't you know you have wrenched the very heart out of me, you little brown witch? I loved you from the very first moment of our dance together. You've been too much for me all through. I had to have you. I simply had to have you."

She trembled afresh at his words, but she clung closer. If the fear deepened, so also did the fascination. She tried to picture him as hers—hers, and failed. He was so fine, so splendid, so much too big for her.

He went on, dropping his voice lower, his breath warm upon her neck. "Are you going to take all and give—nothing, Daphne? Did they make you without a heart, I wonder? Like a robin that mates afresh a dozen times in a season? Haven't you anything to give me, little sweetheart? Are you going to keep me waiting for a long, long time, and then send me empty away?"

That moved her. That he should stoop to plead with her seemed so amazing, almost a fabulous state of affairs.

With a little sob, she lifted her face at last. "Oh, Apollo!" she said brokenly. "Apollo the magnificent! I am all yours—all yours! But don't—don't take too much—at a time!"

The plea must have touched him, accompanied as it was by that full surrender. He held her a moment, looking down into her eyes with the fiery possessiveness subdued to a half-veiled tenderness in his own.

Then, very gently, even with reverence, he bent his face to hers. "Give me—just what you can spare, then, little sweetheart!" he said. "I can always come again for more now."

She slipped her arms around his neck, and shyly, childishly, she kissed the lips that had devoured her own so mercilessly the night before.

"Yes—yes, I will always give you more!" she said tremulously.

He took her face between his hands and kissed her in return, not violently, but with confidence. "That seals you for my very own," he said. "You will never run away from me again?"

But she would not promise that. The memory of the previous night still scorched her intolerably whenever her thoughts turned that way.

"I shan't want to run away if—if you stay as you are now," she told him confusedly.

He laughed in his easy way. "Oh, Daphne, I shall have a lot to teach you when we are married. How soon do you think you can be ready?"

She started in his hold at the question, and then quickly gave herself fully back to him again. "I don't know a bit. You'll have to ask mother. P'raps—she may not allow it at all."

"Ho! Won't she?" said Sir Eustace. "I think I know better. What about that trip on the yacht in July? Can you be ready in time for that?"

"Oh, I expect I could be ready sooner than that," said Dinah naively.

"You could?" He smiled upon her. "Well, next week then! What do you say to next week?"

But she shrank again at that. "Oh no! Not possibly! Not possibly! You—you're laughing!" She looked at him accusingly.

He caught her to him. "You baby! You innocent! Yes, I'm going to kiss you. Where will you have it? Just anywhere?"

He held her and kissed her, still laughing, yet with a heat that made her flinch involuntarily; kissed the pointed chin and quivering lips, the swift-shut eyes and soft cheeks, the little, trembling dimple that came and went.

"Yes, you are mine—all mine," he said. "Remember, I have a right to you now that no one else has. Not all the mammas in the world could come between us now."

She laughed, half-exultantly, half-dubiously, peeping at him through her lowered lashes. "I wonder if you'll still say that when—when you've seen—my mother," she murmured.

He kissed her again, kissed anew the dimples that showed and vanished so alluringly. "You will see presently, my Daphne," he said. "But I'm going to have you, you know. That's quite understood, isn't it?"

"Yes," whispered Dinah, with docility.

"No more running away," he insisted. "That's past and done with."

She gave him a fleeting smile. "I couldn't if—if I wanted to."

"I'm glad you realize that," he said.

She clung to him suddenly with a little movement that was almost convulsive. "Oh, are you sure—quite sure—that you wouldn't rather marry Rose de Vigne?"

He uttered his careless laugh. "My dear child, there are plenty of Roses in the world. There is only one—Daphne—Daphne, the fleet of foot—Daphne, the enchantress!"

She clung to him a little faster. "And there is only one Apollo," she murmured. "Apollo the magnificent!"

"We seem to be quite a unique couple," laughed Eustace, with his lips upon her hair.



CHAPTER XXX

THE SECOND SUMMONS

When they went down the hill again to the hotel, Dinah felt as if she were treading on air. The whole world had magically changed for her. Fears still lurked in the background, such fears as she did not dare to turn and contemplate; but she herself had stepped into such a blaze of sunshine that she felt literally bathed from head to foot in the glow.

Her dread of returning to the old home-life had dwindled to a mere shadow. Sir Eustace's absolute confidence on the subject of his desirability as a husband had accomplished this. There would be paens of rejoicing, he told her, and she had actually begun to think that he spoke the truth. She was quite convinced that her mother would be pleased. It was Cinderella and the prince indeed. Who could be otherwise?

Her escapade of the night before had also shrunk to a matter of small importance. Eustace in his grand, easy way had justified her, and she was no longer tormented by the thought of the mute reproach she would encounter in Scott's eyes. She was triumphantly vindicated, and no one would dream of reproaching her now. Isabel too—surely Isabel would be glad, would welcome her as a sister, though the realization of this nearness of relationship made her blush in sheer horror at her presumption.

She to be Lady Studley! She—little, insignificant, moneyless Dinah! The thought of Rose's soft patronage flashed through her brain, and she chuckled aloud. Poor dear Rose, waiting for him at the Court, expecting every day to hear of his promised advent! What a shock for them all! Why, she would rank with the County now! Even Lady Grace would scarcely be in a position to patronize her! Again, quite involuntarily, she chuckled.

"What's the joke?" demanded Sir Eustace.

She blushed very deeply, realizing that she had allowed her thoughts to run away with her.

"There isn't a joke really," she told him. "It wasn't important anyhow. I was only thinking how—how surprised the de Vignes would be."

He frowned momentarily; then he laughed. "Proud of your conquest, eh?" he asked.

She blushed still more deeply. "It's easy to laugh now, but I shall never dare to face them," she murmured.

He took her hand as they walked, linking his fingers in hers with a careless air of possession. "When you are Lady Studley," he said, "I shall not allow you to knock under to anyone—except your husband."

She gave a faint laugh. "I—shall have to learn to swagger," she said. "But I'm afraid I shall never do it as well as you do."

"What? Swagger?" He frowned again. "How dare you accuse me of that?"

"Oh, I didn't! I don't!" Hastily she sought to avert his displeasure. "No, no! I only meant that you were born to it. I'm not. I—I'm very ordinary; not nearly good enough for you."

His frown melted again. "You are—Daphne," he said. "Ah! Here is Scott, coming to look for us! Who is going to break the news to him?"

She made a small, ineffectual attempt to release her hand. Then, under her breath, "He—saw you kiss me last night," she whispered. "Don't you think he may have guessed already?"

A very cynical look came into Eustace's face. "I wonder," he said briefly.

They went on side by side down the white, shining track; but Dinah was no longer treading on air. She could see the slight, insignificant figure that awaited them close to the hotel-entrance, and her heart felt oddly weighted within her. It was not the memory of the night before that oppressed her. That episode had faded almost into nothingness. But the ordeal of facing him, of telling him of the wonderful thing that had just happened to her, seemed suddenly more than she could bear. Something within her seemed to cry out against it. She had a curious feeling of looking out at him across great billows of seething uncertainty that rolled ever higher and higher between them, threatening to separate them for all time.

Yet when she neared him, the tumult of feeling sank again as the quietness of his presence reached her. Out of the tempest she found herself drifting into a safe harbour of still waters.

He moved to meet them, and she heard his voice greet her as he raised his cap. "So you have been for your farewell stroll!"

She did not answer in words, only she freed her hand from Eustace with a resolute little tug and gave it to him.

Eustace spoke, a species of half-veiled insolence in his tone. "Like the psalmist she went forth weeping and has returned bearing her sheaf with her—in the form of a fairly substantial fiance."

Dinah ventured to cast a lightning-glance at Scott to see how he took the information and was conscious of an instant's shock. He looked so grey, so ill, like a man who had received a deadly wound.

But the impression passed in a flash as she felt his hand close upon hers.

"My dear," he said simply, "I'm awfully pleased."

The warm grasp did her good. It brought her swiftly back to a normal state of mind. She drew a hard breath and met his eyes, reassuring herself in a moment with the conviction that after all he looked quite as usual. Somehow her imagination had tricked her. His kindly smile seemed to make everything right.

"Oh, it is kind of you not to mind," she said impulsively.

Whereat Sir Eustace laughed. "He is rather magnanimous, isn't he? Well, come along and tell Isabel!"

Scott's eyes came swiftly to him. He released Dinah, and offered his hand to his brother. "Let me congratulate you, old chap!" he said, his voice rather low. "I hope you will both have—all happiness."

"Thanks!" said Eustace. He took the hand, looking at the younger man with keen, hawk-eyes. "We mean to make a bid for it anyway. Dinah is lucky in one thing at least. She will have an ideal brother-in-law."

The words were carelessly spoken, but they were not without meaning. Scott flushed slightly; even while for an instant he smiled. "I shall do my best in that capacity," he said. "But before you go in, I want you to wait a moment. Isabel has had a slight fainting attack. We mustn't take her by surprise."

"A fainting attack!" Sharply Eustace echoed the words. "How did it happen?" he demanded.

Scott raised his shoulders. "We were talking together. I can't tell you exactly what caused it. It came rather suddenly. Biddy and I brought her round almost immediately, and she declares that she will make the journey. She did not wish me to tell you of it, but I thought it better."

"Of coarse." Sir Eustace's voice was short and stern; his face wore a heavy frown. "But something must have caused it. What were you talking about?"

Scott hesitated for a second. "I can't tell you that, old fellow," he said then.

Eustace uttered a brief laugh. "Too personal, eh? Well, how did it happen? Did she suddenly lose consciousness?"

"She suddenly gasped, and said her heart had stopped. She fell across the table. I called to Biddy, and we lifted her and gave her brandy. That brought her to very quickly. I left her lying down in her room. But she says she feels much better, and she is very set upon leaving the arrangements for the journey unaltered."

Scott spoke rather wearily. Dinah's heart went out to him in swift sympathy which she did not know how to express.

"May I—could I—go to her?" she suggested, after a moment timidly.

Scott turned to her instantly. "Please do! I know she would like to see you. We ought to be starting in another quarter of an hour. The sleigh will be here directly."

"May I do as I like about—about telling her?" Dinah asked, pausing.

Scott's eyes shone with a very kindly gleam. "Of course, I know you will not startle her. You always do her good."

The words followed her as she turned away. How good he was to her! How full of understanding and human sympathy! Her heart throbbed with a warmth that filled her with an odd desire to weep. She wished that Eustace did not treat him quite so arrogantly.

And then, looking back, she reproached herself for the thought; for Eustace had linked a hand in his arm, and she saw that they were walking together in complete accord.

"But I will never—no, never—call him Stumpy!" she said to herself, as she passed into the hotel.

She went up the stairs rapidly, and hastened to Isabel's room. That look she had caught in Scott's face—that stricken look—had doubtless been brought there by his sudden anxiety for his sister. That would fully account for it, she was sure.

On the threshold of Isabel's room an overwhelming nervousness assailed her. How was she going to tell her of the wonderful event that had taken place in the last half-hour? On the other hand, how could she possibly suppress so tremendous a matter? And again, the disquieting question arose; could she be ill—really ill? Scott had looked so troubled—so unutterably sad.

With an effort she summoned her courage, and softly knocked.

Instantly a low voice answered her, bidding her enter. She opened the door and went in, feeling as though she were treading sacred ground.

But Isabel's voice spoke again instantly, greeting her; and in a moment all her doubts, all her forebodings, were gone.

"Come in, little sweetheart!" Isabel said.

And she advanced with quickened steps to find Isabel lying propped on the sofa, looking at her, smiling up at her, with such a glory on her wasted face as made it "as it had been the face of an angel."

In an instant Dinah was on her knees beside her, with loving arms clasping her close. "Oh, darling, I've only just heard. Are you better? Are you better?" she said yearningly.

Isabel held her, and fondly kissed the upturned lips. "Why, I believe Scott has been frightening you," she said. "Silly fellow! Yes, dear. I am well—quite well."

"You are sure?" Dinah insisted. "You are really not ill?"

Isabel's smile had in it—had she but known it—a gleam of the Divine. "My dearest, all is well with me," she said. "I lay down for a little to please Scott. But I am going to get up now. Where have you been since dejeuner? I missed you."

Dinah clung closer, hiding her face.

Instantly Isabel's arms tightened. The passionate tenderness of them thrilled her through and through. "Why, child, what has happened?" she whispered. "Tell me! Tell me!"

But Dinah only hid her face a little deeper. "I don't know how," she murmured.

There fell a silence. Then, under her breath, Isabel spoke. "My darling, whisper—just whisper! Who—is it?"

And very, very faintly, at last Dinah made answer. "It—it is—Sir Eustace."

There fell another silence, longer, deeper, than the first. Then Isabel uttered a short, hard sigh, and, stooping, kissed the bowed, curly head. "God bless and keep you always, dearest!" she said.

Something in the words—or was it the tone?—pierced Dinah. She turned her face slightly upwards. "I—I was afraid you wouldn't be pleased," she faltered. "Do—do forgive me—if you can!"

"Forgive you!" All the wealth of Isabel's love was in the words. "Why, darling, I have been wanting you for my own little sister ever since I first saw you."

"Oh, have you?" Eagerly Dinah lifted her head. Her eyes were shining, her cheeks very flushed. "Then you are pleased?" she said earnestly. "You really are pleased?"

Isabel smiled at her very sadly, very fondly. "My darling, if you are happy, I am more than pleased," she said.

Yet Dinah was puzzled, not wholly satisfied. She received Isabel's kiss with a certain wistfulness. "I feel—somehow—as if I've done wrong," she said. "Yet—yet—Scott—" she halted over the name, uttering it shyly—"said he was—awfully pleased."

"Ah! You have told Scott!" There was a sharp, almost a wrung, sound in Isabel's voice; but the next moment she controlled it, and spoke with steady resolution. "Then, my dear, you needn't have any misgivings. If you love Eustace and he loves you, it is the best thing possible for you both." She held Dinah to her again and kissed her; then very tenderly released her. "You must run and get ready, dear child. It is getting late."

Dinah went obediently, still with that bewildered feeling of having somehow taken a wrong turning. She was convinced in her own mind that the news had not been welcome to Isabel, disguise it how she would. And suddenly through her mind there ran the memory of those words she had uttered a few weeks before. "Never prefer the tinsel to the true gold!" She had not fully understood their meaning then. Now very vividly it flashed upon her. Isabel had compared her two brothers in that brief sentence. Isabel's estimate of the one was as low as that of the other was high. Isabel did not love Eustace—the handsome, debonair brother who had once been all the world to her.

A little, sick feeling of doubt went through Dinah! Had she—by any evil chance—had she made a mistake?

And then the man's overwhelming personality swung suddenly through her consciousness, filling all her being, possessing her, dominating her. She flung the doubt from her, as one flings away a poisonous insect. He was her own—her very own; her lover, the first, the best,—Apollo the Magnificent!

In Isabel's room old Biddy Maloney stood, gazing down at her mistress with eyes of burning devotion.

"And is it yourself that's feeling better now?" she questioned fondly.

Isabel raised herself, smiling her sad smile. "Oh, Biddy," she said, "for myself I feel that all is well—all will be well. The dawn draws nearer—every hour."

Biddy shook her head with pursed lips. "Ye shouldn't talk so, mavourneen. It's the Almighty who has the ruling. Ye wouldn't wish to go before your time?"

"Before my time! Oh, Biddy! When I have lingered in the prison-house so long!" Slowly Isabel rose to her feet. She looked at Biddy almost whimsically. "I think He will take that into the reckoning," she said. "Do you know, Biddy, this is the second summons that has come to me? And I think—I think," her face was glorified again as the face of one who sees a vision—"I think the third will be the last."

Biddy's black eyes screwed up suddenly. She turned her face away.

"Will we be getting ready to go now, Miss Isabel?" she asked after a moment, in a voice that shook.

The glory died out of Isabel's face, though the reflection of it still lingered in her eyes. "I am very selfish, Biddy," she said. "Can you guess what Miss Dinah has just told me?"

"Arrah thin, I can," said Biddy, with a touch of aggressiveness. "I've seen it coming for a long time past. And ye didn't ought to allow it at all, Miss Isabel. It's a mistake, that's what it is. It's just a bad mistake."

"Not if he loves her, Biddy." Isabel spoke gently, but there was a hint of reproof in her voice.

Biddy, however, remained quite unabashed. "He love her!" she snorted. "As if he ever loved anybody besides himself! Talk about the lion and the lamb, Miss Isabel! It's a cruel shame to let her go to such as him. And what'll poor Master Scott do at all? And he worshipping the little fairy feet of her!"

"Hush, Biddy, hush!" Isabel spoke with decision. "I hope—I trust—that he isn't very grievously disappointed. But if he is, it is the one thing that neither you nor I must ever seem to suspect."

"Ah!" grumbled Biddy mutinously. "And isn't that just like Sir Eustace, with all the world to pick from, to choose the one thing—the one little wild rose—as Master Scott had set his heart on? He's done it from his cradle. Always the one thing someone else wanted he must grab for himself. But is it too late, Miss Isabel darlint?" Sudden hope shone in the old woman's eyes. "Is it really too late? Couldn't ye drop a hint to the dear lamb? Sure and she's fond of Master Scott! Maybe she'd turn to him after all if she knew."

Isabel shook her head almost sternly. "Biddy, no! This is no affair of ours. If Master Scott suspected for a moment what you have just said to me, he would never forgive you."

"May I come in?" said Scott's voice at the door. "My dear, you are looking better. Are you well enough to start?"

"Yes, of course." Isabel moved towards him, her hands extended in mute affection.

He took and held them. "Dinah has told you? I am sure you are glad. Eustace is waiting downstairs. Come and tell him how glad you are!"

His eyes, very straight and steadfast, met hers.

Isabel tried to speak in answer, but caught her breath in a sudden sob.

He waited a second. Then, "Isabel!" he said gently.

Sharply she controlled herself. "Yes. Yes. Let us go!" she said. "I must—congratulate Eustace."

They went; and old Biddy was left alone.

She looked after them with a piteous expression on her wrinkled face; then suddenly, with a wistful gesture, she clasped her old worn hands.

"I pray the Almighty," she said, with great earnestness, "to open the dear young lady's eyes, before it is too late. And if He wants anyone to help Him—sure it's meself that'll be only too pleased."

It was the most impressive prayer that Biddy had ever uttered.



PART II



CHAPTER I

CINDERELLA'S PRINCE

The early dusk of February was falling, together with a fine, drenching rain. The trees that over-hung the muddy lane were beating their stark branches together as though in despair over the general hopelessness of the outlook. The west wind that raced across the brown fields had the sharpness of snow in its train.

"We shall catch it before we've done," said Bathurst to his hunter.

Rupert the hunter, a dapple grey with powerful hindquarters, cocked a knowing ear in a fashion that Dinah always described as "his smile."

It had not been a good day for either of them. The meet had been at a considerable distance, there had been no run worth mentioning; and now that it was over they were returning, thoroughly tired, from the kennels.

Bathurst's pink coat clung to him like a sack, all streaked and darkened with rain. It had weathered a good many storms in its time, as its many varieties of tint testified; but despite this fact, its wearer never failed to look a sportsman and a gentleman. There was nothing of the vagabond about Bathurst, but he had the vagabond's facility for making himself at home wherever he went. He was never at a loss, never embarrassed, never affronted. He took life easily, as he himself put it; and on the whole he found it good.

Riding home at a jog-trot in that driving rain with the prospect of having to feed and rub down Rupert at the end of it before he could attend to his own needs was not a particularly entrancing prospect; but he faced it philosophically. After today the little girl would be at home, and she could do it for him again. She loved to wait on him hand and foot, and it really was a pleasure to let her.

He whistled cheerily to himself as he wended his leisurely way through the dripping lane that made the shortest cut to his home. It would be nice to have the little girl home again. Lydia was all very well—a good wife, as wives went—but there was no doubt about it that Dinah's presence made a considerable difference to his comfort. The child was quick to forestall his wants; he sometimes thought that she was even more useful to him than a valet would have been. He had missed her more than he would have dreamed possible.

Lydia had missed her too; he was sure of that. She had been peculiarly short of temper lately. Not that he ever took much notice; he was too used to her tantrums for that. But it certainly was more comfortable when Dinah was at home to bear the brunt of them. Yes, on the whole he was quite pleased that the little girl was coming back. It would make a difference to him in many ways.

He wondered what time she would arrive. He had known, but he had forgotten. He believed it was to be some time in the evening. Her grand friends had arranged to stay at Great Mallowes, three miles, away for the night, and one of them—the maid probably—was to bring Dinah home. He had smiled over this arrangement, and Lydia had openly scoffed at it. As if a girl of Dinah's age were not capable of travelling alone! But then of course she had been ill, very ill according to all accounts; and it was quite decent of them to bestow so much care upon her.

He fell to wondering if the child had got spoilt at all during her long absence from home and the harsh discipline thereof. If so, there was a hard time before her; for Lydia was never one to stand any nonsense. She had always been hard on her first-born, unreasonably hard, he sometimes thought; though it was not his business to interfere. The task of chastising the daughter of the family was surely the mother's exclusive prerogative; and certainly Lydia had carried it out very thoroughly. And if at times he thought her over-severe, he could not deny that the result achieved was eminently satisfactory. Dinah was always docile and active in his service—altogether a very good child; and this was presumably due to her mother's training. No, on the whole he had not much fault to find with either of them. Doubtless Lydia understood her own sex best.

He was nearing the end of the long lane; it terminated close to his home. Rupert quickened his pace. They were both splashed with mud from shoulder to heel. They had both had more than enough of the wet and the slush.

"That's right, Rupert, my boy!" the man murmured. "Finish in style!"

They came out from beneath the over-arching trees, emerging upon the high road that led from Great Mallowes to Perrythorpe. The hoot of a motor-horn caused Rupert to prick his ears, and his master reined him back as two great, shining head-lights appeared round a curve. They drew swiftly near, flashed past, and were gone meteor-like into the gloom.

"Whose car was that, I wonder?" mused Bathurst.

"The de Vignes's? It didn't look like one of the Court cars, but the old bird is always buying something new. Lucky devil!"

The thought of the Colonel renewed his thoughts of Dinah. Certain hints the former had dropped had made him wonder a little if the child were always as demure as she seemed. Not that Colonel de Vigne had actually found fault with her. He was plainly fond of her. But he had not spoken as if Dinah had effaced herself as completely abroad as she did at home.

"Oh, yes, the little baggage enjoyed herself—was as gay as a lark—till she got ill," he had said. "You may find her something of a handful when she gets back, Bathurst. She's stretched her wings a bit since she left you."

Bathurst shrugged his shoulders with the comforting reflection that he would not have the trouble of dealing with her. If she had been giddy, after all, it was but natural. Her mother had not been particularly steady in the days of her wild youth. And anyhow he was sure her mother would speedily break her in again. She had a will of iron before which Dinah was always forced to bend.

He rode on along the highroad. It was not more than half a mile farther to his home on the outskirts of the village. Somewhere in the gloom ahead of him church-bells were pealing. It was practice-night, he remembered. Dinah loved the sound of the bells. She would feel that they were ringing in her honour. Funny little Dinah! The child was full of fancies of that sort. Just as well perhaps, for it was the only form of amusement that ever came into her home life.

The gay peal turned into a deafening clashing as at length he neared his home. The old church stood only a stone's throw further on. They were ringing the joy-bells with a vengeance. And then very suddenly he caught sight of the tail-lamp of a car close to his own gate.

Dinah had returned then. They had actually chartered that car to convey her from Great Mallowes. He pursed his lips to a whistle. The little girl had been in clover indeed.

"She certainly won't think much of the home crusts after this," he murmured to himself.

He walked Rupert round to the tumble-down stable, and dismounted.

For the next quarter of an hour he was busy over the animal. He thought it a little strange that Dinah did not spy the stable-lamp from the kitchen and come dancing out to greet him. He also wondered why the car lingered so long. It looked as if someone other than the maid had accompanied her, and were staying to tea.

He never took tea after a day's hunting; hot whisky and water and a bath formed his customary programme, and then a tasty supper and bed.

He supposed on this occasion that he would have to go in and show himself, though he was certainly not fit to be seen. Reluctantly he pulled the bedraggled pink coat on again. After all, it did not greatly matter. Hunting was its own excuse. No sportsman ever returned in the apple-pie order in which he started.

Carelessly he sauntered in by way of the back premises, and was instantly struck by the sound of a man's voice, well-bred, with a slightly haughty intonation, speaking in one of the front rooms of the little house.

"Dinah seemed to think that she could not keep it in till to-morrow," it said, with easy assurance. "So I thought I had better come along with her to-night and get it over."

The words reached Bathurst as he arrived in the small square hall, and he stopped dead. "Hullo! Hullo!" he murmured softly to himself.

And then came his wife's voice, a harsh, determined voice, "Do I understand that you wish to marry my daughter?"

"That's the idea," came the suave reply. "You don't know me, of course, but I think I can satisfy you that I am not an undesirable parti. My family is considered fairly respectable, as old families go. I am the ninth baronet in direct succession; and I have a very fair amount of worldly goods to offer my wife."

Mrs. Bathurst broke in upon him, a tremor of eagerness in her hard voice. "If that is the case, of course I have no objection," she said. "Dinah won't do any better for herself than that. It seems to me that she will have the best of the bargain. But that is your affair. She's full young. I don't suppose you want to marry her yet, do you?"

"I'd marry her to-night if I could," said Sir Eustace, with his careless laugh.

But Mrs. Bathurst did not laugh with him. "We'll have the banns published and everything done proper," she said. "Hasty marriages as often as not aren't regular. Here, Dinah! Don't stand there listening! Go and see if the kettle boils!"

It was at this point that Bathurst deemed that the moment had arrived to present himself. He entered, almost running into Dinah about to hurry out.

"Hullo!" he said. "Hullo!" and taking her by the shoulders, kissed her.

She clung to him for a moment, her sweet face burning. "Oh, Dad!" she murmured in confusion, "Oh, Dad!"

With his arm about her, he turned her back into the room. "You come back and introduce me to your new friend!" he said. "I've got to thank him, you know, for taking such care of you."

She yielded, but not very willingly. She was painfully embarrassed, almost incoherent, as she obeyed Bathurst's behest.

"This—this is Dad," she murmured.

Sir Eustace came forward with his leisurely air of confidence. His great bulk seemed to fill the low room. He looked even more magnificent than usual.

"Ah, sir, you have just come in from hunting," he said. "I hope I don't intrude. It's a beastly wet evening. I should think you're not sorry to get in."

Mrs. Bathurst, tall, bony, angular, with harsh, gipsy features that were still in a fashion boldly handsome, broke in upon her husband's answering greeting.

"Ronald, this gentleman tells me he wants to marry Dinah. It is very sudden, but these things often are. You will give your consent of course. I have already given mine."

"Easy, easy!" laughed Bathurst. "Why exceed the speed limit in this reckless fashion? You are Sir Eustace Studley? I am very pleased to meet you."

He held out his hand to Sir Eustace, and gave him the grasp of good-fellowship. It seemed to Dinah that the very atmosphere changed magically with the coming of her father. No difficult situation ever dismayed him. He and Sir Eustace were not dissimilar in this respect. Whatever the circumstances, they both knew how to hold their own with absolute ease. It was a faculty which she would have given much to possess.

Sir Eustace was laughing in his careless, well-bred way. "It's rather a shame to spring the matter on you like this," he said. "I ought to have waited to ask your consent to the engagement, but I am afraid I am not a very patient person, and I wanted to make sure of your daughter before we parted. We are staying at Great Mallowes—at the Royal Stag. May I come over to-morrow and put things on a more business-like footing?"

"Oh, don't hurry away!" said Bathurst easily. "Sit down and have some tea with us! It is something of a surprise certainly but a very agreeable one. Lydia, what about tea? Or perhaps you prefer a whisky and soda?"

"Tea, thanks," said Sir Eustace, and seated himself with his superb air of complete assurance.

Mrs. Bathurst turned upon her daughter. "Dinah, how many more times am I to tell you to go and see if the kettle boils?"

Dinah started, as one rudely awakened from an entrancing dream. "I am sorry," she murmured in confusion. "I forgot."

She fled from the room with the words, and her mother, with dark brows drawn, looked after her for a moment, then sat down facing Sir Eustace.

"I should like to know," she said aggressively, "what you are prepared to do for her."

Sir Eustace smiled in his aloof, slightly supercilious fashion. He had been more or less prepared for Dinah's mother, but the temptation to address her as "My good woman" was almost more than he could withstand.

"Will you not allow me," he said, icily courteous, "to settle this important matter with Mr. Bathurst to-morrow? He will then be in a position to explain it to you."

Mrs. Bathurst made a movement of fierce impatience. She had been put in her place by this stranger and furiously she resented it. But the man was a baronet, and a marvellous catch for a son-in-law; and she did not dare to put her resentment into words.

She got up therefore, and flounced angrily to the door. Sir Eustace arose without haste and with a stretch of his long arm opened it for her.

She flung him a glance, half-hostile, half-awed, as she went through. She had a malignant hatred for the upper class, despite the fact that her own husband was a member thereof. And yet she held it in unwilling respect. Sir Eustace's nonchalantly administered snub was far harder to bear than any open rudeness from a man of her own standing would have been.

Fiercely indignant, she entered the kitchen, and caught Dinah peeping at herself in the shining surface of the warming-pan after having removed her hat.

"Ah, that's your game, my girl, is it?" she said. "You've come back the grand lady, have you? You've no further, use for your mother, I daresay. She may work her fingers to the bone for all you care—or ever will care again."

Dinah whizzed round, scarlet and crestfallen. "Oh, Mother! How you startled me! I only wanted to see if—if my hair was tidy."

"And that's one of your lies," said Mrs. Bathurst, with a heavy hand on her shoulder. "They've taught you how to juggle with the truth, that's plain. Oh yes, Lady Studley that is to be, you've learnt a lot since you've been away, I can see—learnt to despise your mother, I'll lay a wager. But I'll show you she's not to be despised by a prinking minx like you. What did I send you in here for, eh?"

"To—to see to the kettle," faltered Dinah, shrinking before the stern regard of the black eyes that so mercilessly held her own.

"And there it is ready to boil over, and you haven't touched it, you worthless little hussy, you! Take that—and dare to disobey me again!"

She dealt the girl a blow with her open hand as she spoke, a swinging, pitiless blow, on the cheek, and pushed her fiercely from her.

Dinah reeled momentarily. The sudden violence of the attack bewildered her. Actually she had almost forgotten how dreadful her mother could be. Then, recovering herself, she went to the fire and stooped over it, without a word. She had a burning sensation at the throat, and she was on the verge of passionate tears. The memory of Isabel's parting embrace, the tender drawing of her arms only a brief half-hour before made this home-coming almost intolerable.

"What's that thing you're wearing?" demanded Mrs. Bathurst abruptly.

Dinah lifted the kettle and turned. "It is a fur-lined coat that—that he bought for me in Paris."

"Then take it off!" commanded Mrs. Bathurst. "And don't you wear it again until I give you leave! How dare you accept presents from the man before I've even seen him?"

"I couldn't help it," murmured Dinah, as she slipped off the luxurious garment that Isabel had chosen for her.

"Couldn't help it!" Bitterly Mrs. Bathurst echoed the words. "You'll say you couldn't help him falling in love with you next! As if you didn't set out to catch him, you little artful brown-faced monkey! Oh, I always knew you were crafty, for all your simple ways. Mind, I don't say you haven't done well for yourself, you have—a deal better than you deserve. But don't ever say you couldn't help it to me again! For if you do, I'll trounce you for it, do you hear? None of your coy airs for me! I won't put up with 'em. You'll behave yourself as long as you're in this house, or I'll know the reason why."

To all of which Dinah listened in set silence, telling herself with desperate insistence that it would not be for long. Sir Eustace did not mean to be kept waiting, and he would deliver her finally and for all time.

She did not know exactly why her mother was angry. She supposed she resented the idea of losing her slave. There seemed no other possible reason, for love for her she had none. Dinah knew but too cruelly well that she had been naught but an unwelcome burden from the very earliest days of her existence. Till she met Isabel, she had never known what real mother-love could be.

She wondered if her fiance would notice the red mark on her cheek when she carried in the teapot; but he was holding a careless conversation with her father, and only gave her a glance and a smile.

During the meal that followed he scarcely addressed her or so much as looked her way. He treated her mother with a freezing aloofness that made her tremble inwardly. She wondered how he dared.

When at length he rose to go, however, his attention returned to Dinah. He laid a dominating hand upon her shoulder. "Are you coming to see me off?"

She glanced at her mother in involuntary appeal, but failed to catch her eye. Silently she turned to the door.

He took leave of her parents with the indifference of one accustomed to popularity. "I shall be round in the morning," he said to her father. "About twelve? That'll suit me very well; unless I wait till the afternoon and bring my sister. I know she hopes to come over if she is well enough. That is, of course, if you don't object to an informal call."

He spoke as if in his opinion the very fact of its informality conferred a favour, and again Dinah trembled lest her mother should break forth into open rudeness.

But to her amazement Mrs. Bathurst seemed somewhat overawed by the princely stranger. She even smiled in a grim way as she said, "I will be at home to her."

Sir Eustace made her a ceremonious bow and went out sweeping Dinah along with him. He closed the door with a decision there was no mistaking, and the next moment he had her in his arms.

"You poor little frightened mouse!" he said. "No wonder—no wonder you never knew before what life, real life, could be!"

She clung to him with all her strength, burying her face in the fur collar of his coat. "Oh, do marry me, quick—quick—quick!" she besought him, in a muffled whisper. "And take me away!"

He gathered her close in his arms, so close that she trembled again. Her nerves were all on edge that night.

"If they won't let me have you in a month from now," he said, in a voice that quivered slightly, "I swear I'll run away with you."

There was no echo of humour in his words though she tried to laugh at them, and ever he pressed her closer and closer to his heart, till panting she had to lift her face. And then he kissed her in his passionate compelling way, holding her shy lips with his own till he actually forced them to respond. She felt as if his love burned her, but, even so, she dared not shrink from it. There was so much at stake. Her mother's lack of love was infinitely harder to endure.

And so she bore the fierce flame of his passion unflinching even though her spirit clamoured wildly to be free, choosing rather to be consumed by it than left a beaten slave in her house of bondage.

His kisses waked in her much more of fear than rapture. That untamed desire of his frightened her to the very depths of her being, but yet it was infinitely preferable to the haughty indifference with which he regarded all the rest of the world. It meant that he would not let her go, and that in itself was comfort unspeakable to Dinah. He meant to have her at any price, and she was very badly in need of deliverance, even though she might have to pay for it, and pay heavily.

It was at this point, actually while his fiery kisses were scorching her lips, that a very strange thought crept all unawares into her consciousness. If she ever needed help, if she ever needed escape, she had a friend to whom she could turn—a staunch and capable friend who would never fail her. She was sure that Scott would find a way to ease the burden if it became too heavy. Her faith in him, his wisdom, his strength, was unbounded. And he helped everyone—the valiant servant Greatheart, protector of the helpless, sustainer of the vanquished.

When her lover was gone at last, she closed the door and leaned against it, feeling weak in every fibre.

Bathurst, coming out a few moments later, was struck by her spent look. "Well, Dinah lass," he said lightly, "you look as if it had cost something of an effort to land your catch. But he's a mighty fine one, I will say that for him."

She went to him, twining her arm in his, forcing herself to smile. "Oh, Dad," she said, "he is fine, isn't he?" But—but—she uttered the words almost in spite of herself—"you should see his brother. You should see—Scott."

"What? Is he finer still?" laughed Bathurst, pinching her cheek. "Have you got the whole family at your feet, you little baggage?"

She flushed very deeply. "Oh no! Oh no! I didn't mean that. Scott—Scott is not a bit like that. He is—he is—" And there she broke off, for who could hope to convey any faithful impression of this good friend of hers? There were no words that could adequately describe him. With a little sigh she turned from the subject. "I'm glad you like Eustace," she said shyly.

Bathurst laughed a little, then bent unexpectedly, and kissed her. "It's a case of Cinderella and the prince," he said lightly. "But the luck isn't all on Cinderella's side, I'm thinking."

She clung to him eagerly. "Oh, Daddy, thank you! Thank you! Do you know—it's funny—Scott used to call me Cinderella!"

Bathurst crooked his brows quizzically. "How original of him! This Scott seems to be quite a wonderful person. And what was your pet name for him I wonder, eh, sly-boots?"

She laughed in evident embarrassment. There was something implied in her father's tone that made her curiously reluctant to discuss her hero. And yet, in justification of the man himself, she felt she must say something.

"His brother and sister call him—Stumpy," she said, "because he is little and he limps. But I—" her face was as red as the hunting-coat against which it nestled—"I called him—Mr. Greatheart. He is—just like that."

Mr. Bathurst laughed again, tweaking her ear. "Altogether an extraordinary family!" he commented. "I must meet this Mr. Stumpy Greatheart. Now suppose you run upstairs and turn on the hot water. And when you've done that, you can take my boots down to the kitchen to dry. And mind you don't fall foul of your mother, for she strikes me as being a bit on the ramp tonight!"

He kissed her again, and she clung to him very fast for a moment or two, tasting in that casual, kindly embrace all the home joy she had ever known.

Then, hearing her mother's step, she swiftly and guiltily disengaged herself and fled up the stairs like a startled bird. As she prepared his bath for him, the wayward thought came to her that if only he and she had lived alone together, she would never have wanted to get married at all—even for the delight of being Lady Studley instead of "poor little Dinah Bathurst!"



CHAPTER II

WEDDING ARRANGEMENTS

It was certainly not love at first sight that prompted Mrs. Bathurst to take a fancy to Isabel Everard.

Secretly Dinah had dreaded their meeting, fearing that innate antagonism which her mother invariably seemed to cherish against the upper class. But within a quarter of an hour of their meeting she was aware of a change of attitude, a quenching of the hostile element, a curious and wholly new sensation of peace.

For though Isabel's regal carriage and low, musical voice, marked her as one of the hated species, her gentleness banished all impression of pride. She treated Dinah's mother with an assumption of friendliness that had in it no trace of condescension, and she was so obviously sincere in her wish to establish a cordial relation that it was impossible to remain ungracious.

"I can't feel that we are strangers," she said, with her rare smile when Dinah had departed to fetch the tea. "Your little Dinah has done so much for me—more than I can ever tell you. That I am to have her for a sister seems almost too good to be true."

"I wonder you think she's good enough," remarked Mrs. Bathurst in her blunt way. "She isn't much to look at. I've done my best to bring her up well, but I never thought of her turning into a fine lady. I question if she's fit for it."

"If she were a fine lady, I don't think I should think so highly of her," Isabel said gently. "But as to her being unfit to fill a high position, she is only inexperienced and she will learn very quickly. I am willing to teach her all in my power."

"Aye, learn to despise her mother," commented Mrs. Bathurst, with sudden bitterness, "after all the trouble I've taken to make her respect me."

"I should never teach her that," Isabel answered quietly. "And I am sure that she would be quite incapable of learning it. Mrs. Bathurst, do you really think that worldly position is a thing that greatly matters to anyone in the long run? I don't."

It was then that a faint, half-grudging admiration awoke in the elder woman's resentful soul, and she looked at Isabel with the first glimmer of kindliness. "You're right," she said slowly, "it don't matter to those who've got it. But to those who haven't—" her eyes glowed red for a moment—"you don't know how it galls," she said.

And then she flushed dully, realizing that she had made a confidante of one of the hated breed.

But Isabel's hand was on hers in a moment; her eyes, full of understanding, looked earnest friendship into hers. "Oh, I know," she said. "It is the little things that gall us all, until—until some great—some fundamental—sorrow wrenches our very lives in twain. And then—and then—one can almost laugh to think one ever cared about them."

Her voice throbbed with feeling. She had lifted the veil for a moment to salve the other woman's bitterness.

And Mrs. Bathurst realized it, and was touched. "Ah! You've suffered," she said.

Isabel bent her head. "But it is over," she said. "I married a man who, they said, was beneath me. But—God knows—he was above me—in every way. And then—I lost him." Her voice sank.

Mrs. Bathurst's hand came down with a clumsy movement upon hers. "He died?" she said.

"Yes." Almost in a whisper Isabel made answer. "For years I would not face it—would not believe it. He went from me so suddenly—oh, God, so suddenly—" a tremor of anguish sounded in the low words; but in a moment she raised her head, and her eyes were shining with a brightness that no pain could dim. "It is over," she said. "It is quite, quite over. My night is past and can never come again. I am waiting now for the full day. And I know that I have not very long to wait. I have not seen him—no, I have not seen him. But—twice now—I have heard his voice."

"Poor soul! Poor soul!" said Mrs. Bathurst.

It was all the sympathy she could express; but it came from her heart. She no longer regretted her own burst of confidence. The spontaneous answer that it had evoked had had a magically softening effect upon her. In all her life no one had ever charmed her thus. She was astonished herself at the melting of her hardness.

"You've suffered worse than I have," she said, "for I never cared for any man like that. I was let down badly when I was a girl, and I've never had any opinion of any of 'em since. My husband's all right, so far as he goes. But he isn't the sort of man to worship. Precious few of 'em are."

Whereat Isabel laughed, a soft, sad laugh. "That is why worldly position matters so little," she said. "If by chance the right man really comes, nothing else counts. He is just everything."

"Maybe you're right," said Mrs. Bathurst, with gloomy acquiescence. "Anyhow, it isn't for me to say you're wrong."

And this was why when Dinah brought in the tea, she found a wholly new element in the atmosphere, and missed the customary sharp rebuke from her mother's lips when she had to go back for the sugar-tongs.

She had been disappointed that her friend Scott had not been of the party. Isabel's explanation that he had gone home at Eustace's wish to attend to some business had not removed an odd little hurt sense of having been defrauded. She had counted upon seeing Scott that day. It was almost as if he had failed her when she needed him, though why she seemed to need him she could not have said, nor could he possibly have known that she would do so.

Sir Eustace was in her father's den. She was sure that they were getting on very well together from the occasional bursts of laughter with which their conversation was interspersed. They were not apparently sticking exclusively to business. And now that Isabel had won her mother, deeply though she rejoiced over the conquest, she felt a little—a very little—forlorn. They were all talking about her, but if Scott had been there he would have talked to her and made her feel at ease. She could not understand his going, even at his brother's behest. It seemed incredible that he should not want to see her home.

She sat meekly in the background, thinking of him, while she drank her tea; and then, just as she finished, there came the sound of voices at the door, and her father and Sir Eustace came in. They were laughing still. Evidently the result of the interview was satisfactory to both. Sir Eustace greeted his hostess with lofty courtesy, and passed on straight to her side.

She turned and tingled at his approach; he was looking more princely than ever. Instinctively she rose.

"What do you want to get up for?" demanded her mother sharply.

Sir Eustace reached his little trembling fiancee, and took the eager hand she stretched to him. His blue eyes flashed their fierce flame over her upturned, quivering face. "Take me into the kitchen—anywhere!" he murmured. "I want you to myself."

She nodded. "Don't you want any tea? All right. Dad doesn't either. I'll clear away."

"No, you don't!" her mother said. "You sit down and behave yourself! You'll clear when I tell you to; not before."

Sir Eustace wheeled round to her, the flame of his look turning to ice. "With your permission, madam," he said with extreme formality, "Dinah and I are going to retire to talk things over."

He had his way. It was obvious that he meant to have it. He motioned to Dinah with an imperious gesture to precede him, and she obeyed, not daring to glance in her mother's direction.

Mrs. Bathurst said no more. Something in Sir Eustace's bearing seemed to quell her. She watched him go with eyes that shone with a hot resentment under drawn brows. It took Isabel's utmost effort to charm her back to a mood less hostile.

As for Dinah, she led her fiance back to her father's den in considerable trepidation. To be compelled to resist her mother's will was a state of affairs that filled her with foreboding.

But the moment she was alone with him she forgot all but the one tremendous fact of his presence, for with the closing of the door he had her in his arms.

She clung to him desperately close, feeling as one struggling in deep waters, caught in a great current that would bear her swiftly, irresistibly,—whither?

He laughed at her trembling with careless amusement. "What, still scared, my brown elf? Where is your old daring? Aren't you allowed to have any spirit at all in this house?"

She answered him incoherently, straining to keep her face hidden out of reach of his upturning hand. "No,—no, it's not that. You don't understand. It's all so new—so strange. Eustace, please—please, don't kiss me yet!"

He laughed again, but he did not press her for the moment. "Your father and I have had no end of a talk," he said. "Do you know what has come of it? Would you like to know?"

"Yes," she murmured shyly.

He was caressing the soft dark ringlets that clustered about her neck.

"About getting married, little sweetheart," he said. "You want to get it over quickly and so do I. There's no reason why we shouldn't in fact. How about the beginning of next month? How about April?"

"Oh, Eustace!" She clung to him closer still; she had no words. But still that sense of being caught, of being borne against her will, possessed her, filling her with dread rather than ecstasy. Whither was she going? Ah, whither?

He went on with his easy self-assurance, speaking as if he held the whole world at his disposal. "We will go South for the honeymoon. I've crowds of things to show you—Rome, Naples, Venice. After that we'll come back and go for that summer trip in the yacht I promised you."

"And Isabel too—and Scott?" asked Dinah, in muffled accents.

He laughed over her head, as at the naive prattling of a child. "What! On our honeymoon? Oh, hardly, I think. I'll see to it that you're not bored. And look here, my elf! I won't have you shy with me any more. Is that understood? I'm not an ogre."

"I think you are—rather," murmured Dinah.

He bent over her, his lips upon her neck. "You—midget! And you think I'm going to devour you? Well, perhaps I shall some day if you go on running away. There's a terrible threat! Now hold up your head, Daphne—Daphne—and let me have that kiss!"

She hesitated a while longer, and then feeling his patience ebbing she lifted her face impulsively to his. "You will be good to me? Promise! Promise!" she pleaded tremulously.

He was laughing still, but his eyes were aflame. "That depends," he declared. "I can't answer for myself when you run away. Come! When are you going to kiss me first? Isn't it time you began?"

She slipped her arms about his neck. Her face was burning. "I will now," she said.

Yet the moment her lips touched his, the old wild fear came upon her. She made a backward movement of shrinking.

He caught her to him. "Daphne!" he said, and kissed her quivering throat.

She did not resist him, but her arms fell apart, and the red blush swiftly died. When he released her, she fell back a step with eyes fast closed, and in a moment her hands went up as though to shield face and neck from the scorching of a furnace.

He watched her, a slight frown drawing his brows. The flame still glittered in his eyes, but his mouth was hard. "Look here, child! Don't be silly!" he said. "If you treat me like a monster, I shall behave like one. I'm made that way."

His voice was curt; it held displeasure. Dinah uncovered her face and looked at him.

"Oh, you're angry!" she said, in tragic accents.

He laughed at that. "About as angry as I could get with a piece of thistledown. But you know, you're not very wise, my Daphne. You've got it in you to madden me, but it's a risky thing to do. Now see here! I've brought you something to make those moss-agate eyes of yours shine. Can you guess what it is?"

His hand was held out to her. She laid her own within it with conscious reluctance. He drew her into the circle of his arm, pressing her to him.

She leaned her head against him with a bewildered sense of self-reproach. "I'm sorry I'm silly, Eustace," she murmured "I expect I'm made that way too. Don't—don't take any notice!"

He touched her forehead lightly with his lips. "You'll get over it, sweetheart," he said. "It won't matter so much after we're married. I can do as I like with you then."

"Oh, I shan't like that," said Dinah quickly.

His arm pressed her closer. "Yes, you will. I'll give you no end of a good time. Now, sweetheart, give me that little hand of yours again! No, the left! There! I wonder if it's small enough. Rather a loose fit, eh? How do you like it?"

He was fitting a ring on to the third finger. Dinah looked and was dazzled. "Oh, Eustace,—diamonds!" she said, in an awed whisper.

"The best I could find," he told her, with princely arrogance. "I hunted through Bond Street for it this morning. Will it do?"

"You went up on purpose? Oh, Eustace!" she laid her cheek with a winning movement against his hand. "You are too good! You are much too good!"

He laughed carelessly. "I'm glad you're satisfied. It's a bond, remember. You must wear it always—till I give you a wedding-ring instead."

She lifted her face and looked at him with shining eyes. "I shall love to wear it," she said. "But I expect I shall have to keep it for best. Mother wouldn't let me wear it always."

"Never mind what your mother says!" he returned. "It's what I say that matters now. We're going to have you to stay at Willowmount in a few days. Isabel is arranging it with your mother now."

"Your home! Oh, how lovely!" Genuine delight was in Dinah's voice. "Scott is there, isn't he?"

He frowned again. "Bother Scott! You're coming to see me—no one else."

She flushed. "Oh yes, I know. And I shall love it—I shall love it! But—do you think I shall be allowed to come?"

"You must come," he said imperiously.

But Dinah looked dubious. "I expect I shall be wanted at home now. And I don't believe we shall get married in April either. I've been away so long."

He laughed, flicking her cheek. "Haven't I always told you that where there's a will there's a way? If necessary, I can run away with you."

She shook her head. "Oh no! I'd rather not. And if—if we're really going to be married in April, I ought to stay at home to get ready."

"Nonsense!" he said carelessly. "You can do that from Willowmount. Isabel will help you. It's less than an hour's run to town."

Dinah opened her eyes wide. "But I shan't shop in town. I shall have to make all my things. I always do."

He laughed again easily, indulgently. "That simplifies matters. You can do that anywhere. What are you going to be married in? White cotton?"

She laughed with him. "I would love to have a real grand wedding," she said, "the sort of wedding Rose de Vigne will have, with bridesmaids and flowers and crowds and crowds of people. Of course I know it can't be done." She gave a little sigh. "But I would love it. I would love it."

He was laughing still. "Why can't it be done? Who's going to prevent it?"

Dinah had become serious. "Dad hasn't money enough for one thing. And then there's Mother. She wouldn't do it."

"Ho! Wouldn't she? I've a notion she'd enjoy it even more than you would. If you want a smart wedding you'd better have it in town. Then the de Vignes and everyone else can come."

"Oh no! I want it to be here." Dinah's eyes began to shine. "Dad knows lots of people round about—County people too. Those are the sort of people I'd like to come. Even Mother might like that," she added reflectively.

"You prefer a big splash in your own little pond to a small one in a good-sized lake, is that it?" questioned Eustace. "Well, have it your own way, my child! But I shouldn't make many clothes if I were you. We will shop in Paris after we are married, and then you can get whatever you fancy."

Dinah's eyes fairly danced at the thought. "I shall love that. I'll tell Daddy, shall I, to keep all his money for the wedding, and then we can buy the clothes afterwards; that is, if you can afford it," she added quickly. "I ought not to let you really."

"You can't prevent me doing anything," he returned, his hand pressing her shoulder. "No one can."

She leaned her head momentarily against his arm. "You—you wouldn't want to do anything that anyone didn't like," she murmured shyly.

"Shouldn't I?" he said and for a moment his mouth was grim. "I am not accustomed to being regarded as an amiable nonentity, I assure you. It's settled then, is it? The first week in April? And you are to come to us for at least a fortnight beforehand."

Dinah nodded, her head bent. "All right,—if Mother doesn't mind."

"What would happen if she did?" he asked curiously.

"It just wouldn't be done," she made answer.

"Wouldn't it? Not if you insisted?"

"I couldn't insist," she said, her voice very low.

"Why couldn't you? I should have thought you had a will of your own. Don't you ever assert yourself?"

"Against her? No, never!" Dinah gave a little shudder. "Don't let's talk of it!" she said. "Isn't it time to go back? I believe I ought to be clearing away."

He detained her for a moment. "You're not going to work like a nigger when you are married to me," he said.

She smiled up at him, a merry, dimpling smile. "Oh no, I shall just enjoy myself then—like Rose de Vigne. I shall be much too grand to work. There! I really must go back. Thank you again ever so much—ever so much—for the lovely ring. I hope you'll never find out how unworthy I am of it."

She drew his head down with quivering courage and bestowed a butterfly kiss upon his cheek. And then in a second she was gone from his hold, gone like a woodland elf with a tinkle of laughter and the skipping of fairy feet.

Sir Eustace followed her flight with his eyes only, but in those eyes was the leaping fire of a passion that burned around her in an ever-narrowing circle. She knew that it was there, but she would not look back to see it. For deep in her heart she feared that flame as she feared nothing else on earth.



CHAPTER III

DESPAIR

"If I had known that this was going to happen, I would never have troubled to cultivate their acquaintance," said Lady Grace fretfully. "I knew of course that that artful little minx was running after the man, but that he could ever be foolish enough to let himself be caught in such an obvious trap was a possibility that I never seriously contemplated."

"It doesn't matter to me," said Rose.

She had said it many times before with the same rather forced smile. It was not a subject that she greatly cared to discuss. The news of Dinah's conquest had come like a thunderbolt. In common with her mother, she had never seriously thought that Sir Eustace could be so foolish. But since the utterly unexpected had come to pass, it seemed to her futile to talk about it. Dinah had secured the finest prize within reach for the moment, and there was no disputing the fact.

"The wedding is to take place so soon too," lamented Lady Grace. "That, I have no doubt, is the doing of that scheming mother of hers. What shall we do about going to it, Rose? Do you want to go, dear?"

"Not in the least, but I am going all the same." Rose was still smiling, and her eyes were fixed. "I think, you know, Mother," she said, "that we might do worse than ask Sir Eustace and his party to stay here for the event."

"My dear Rose!" Lady Grace gazed at her in amazement.

Rose continued to stare into space. "It would be much more convenient for them," she said. "And really we have no reason for allowing people to imagine that we are other than pleased over the arrangement. We shall not be going to town before Easter, so it seems to me that it would be only neighbourly to invite Sir Eustace to stay at the Court for the wedding. Great Mallowes is not a particularly nice place to put up in, and this would be far handier for him."

Lady Grace slowly veiled her astonishment. "Of course, dear; if you think so, it might be managed. We will talk to your father about it, and if he approves I will write to Sir Eustace—or get him to do so. I do not myself consider that Sir Eustace has behaved at all nicely. He was most cavalier about the Hunt Ball. But if you wish to overlook it—well, I shall not put any difficulty in the way."

"I think it would be a good thing to do," said Rose somewhat enigmatically.

The letter that reached Sir Eustace two days later was penned by the Colonel's hand, and contained a brief but cordial invitation to him and his following to stay at Perrythorpe Court for the wedding.

He read it with a careless smile and tossed it over to Scott. "Here is magnanimity," he commented. "Shall we accept the coals of fire?"

Scott read with all gravity and laid it down. "If you want my opinion, I should say 'No,'" he said.

"Why would you say No?" There was a lazy challenge in the question, a provocative gleam in Sir Eustace's blue eyes.

Scott smiled a little. "For one thing I shouldn't enjoy the coals of fire. For another, I shouldn't care to be at too close quarters with the beautiful Miss de Vigne again, if I had your very highly susceptible temperament. And for a third, I believe Isabel would prefer to stay at Great Mallowes."

"You're mighty clever, my son, aren't you?" said Eustace with a supercilious twist of the lips. "But—as it chances—not one of those excellent reasons appeals to me."

"Very well then," said Scott, with the utmost patience. "It is up to you to accept."

"Why should Isabel prefer Great Mallowes?" demanded Sir Eustace. "She knows the de Vignes. It is far better for her to see people, and there is more comfort in a private house than in a hotel."

"Quite so," said Scott. "I am sure she will fall in with your wishes in this respect, whatever they are. Will you write to Colonel de Vigne, or shall I?"

"You can—and accept," returned Sir Eustace imperially.

Scott took a sheet of paper without further words.

His brother leaned back in his chair, his black brows slightly drawn, and contemplated him as he did it.

"By the way, Scott," he said, after a moment, "Dinah's staying here need not make any difference to you in any way. She can't expect to have you at her beck and call as she had in Switzerland. You must make that clear to her."

"Very well, old chap." Scott spoke without raising his head. "You're going to meet her at the station, I suppose?"

"Almost immediately, yes." Eustace got up with a movement of suppressed impatience. "We shall have tea in Isabel's room. You needn't turn up. I'll tell them to send yours in here."

"Oh, don't trouble! I'm going to turn up," very calmly Scott made rejoinder. He had already begun to write; his hand moved steadily across the sheet.

Sir Eustace's frown deepened. "You won't catch the post with those letters if you do."

Scott looked up at last, and his eyes were as steady as his hand had been. "That's my business, old chap," he said quietly. "Don't you worry yourself about that!"

There was a hint of ferocity about Sir Eustace as he met that steadfast look. He stood motionless for a moment or two, then flung round on his heel. Scott returned to his work with the composure characteristic of him, and almost immediately the banging of the door told of his brother's departure.

Then for a second his hand paused; he passed the other across his eyes with the old gesture of weariness, and a short, hard sigh came from him ere he bent again to his task.

Sir Eustace strode across the hall with the frown still drawing his brows. An open car was waiting at the door, but ere he went to it he turned aside and knocked peremptorily at another door.

He opened without waiting for a reply and entered a long, low-ceiled room through which the rays of the afternoon sun were pouring. Isabel, lying on a couch between fire and window, turned her head towards him.

"Haven't you started yet? Surely it is getting very late," she said in her low, rather monotonous voice.

He came to her. "I prefer starting a bit late," he said. "You will have tea ready when we return?"

"Certainly," she said.

He stood looking down at her intently. "Are you all right today?" he asked abruptly.

A faint colour rose in her cheeks. "I am—as usual," she said.

"What does that mean?" Curtly he put the question. "Why don't you go out more? Why don't you get old Lister to make you up a tonic?"

She smiled a little, but there was slight uneasiness behind her smile. Her eyes had the remote look of one who watches the far horizon. "My dear Eustace," she said, "cui bono?"

He stooped suddenly over her. "It is because you won't make the effort," he said, speaking with grim emphasis. "You're letting yourself go again, I know; I've been watching you for the past week. And by heaven, Isabel, you shan't do it! Scott may be fool enough to let you, but I'm not. You've only been home a week, and you've been steadily losing ground ever since you got back. What is it? What's the matter with you? Tell me what is the matter!"

So insistent was his tone, so almost menacing his attitude, that Isabel shrank from him with a gesture too swift to repress. The old pathetic furtive look was in her eyes as she made reply.

"I am very sorry. I don't see how I can help it. I—I am getting old, you know. That is the chief reason."

"You're talking nonsense, my dear girl." Impatiently Eustace broke in. "You are just coming into your prime. I won't have you ruin your life like this. Do you hear me? I won't. If you don't rouse yourself I will find a means to rouse you. You are simply drifting now—simply drifting."

"But into my desired haven," whispered Isabel, with a piteous quiver of the lips.

He straightened himself with a gesture of exasperation. "You are wasting yourself over a myth, an illusion. On my soul, Isabel, what a wicked waste it is! Have you forgotten the days when you and I roamed over the world together? Have you forgotten Egypt and all we did there? Life was worth having then."

"Ah! I thought so." She met his look with eyes that did not seem to see him. "We were children then, Eustace," she said, "children playing on the sands. But the great tide caught us. You breasted the waves, but I was broken and thrown aside. I could never play on the sands again. I can only lie and wait for the tide to come again and float me away."

He clenched his hands. "Do you think I would let you go—like that?" he said.

"It is the only kindness you can do me," she answered in her low voice of pleading.

He swung round to go. "I curse the day," he said very bitterly, "that you ever met Basil Everard! I curse his memory!"

She flinched at the words as if they had been a blow. Her face turned suddenly grey. She clasped her hands very tightly together, saying no word.

He went to the door and paused, his back towards her. "I came in," he said then, "to tell you that the de Vignes have offered to put us up at their place for the wedding. And I have accepted."

He waited for some rejoinder but she made none. It was as if she had not heard. Her eyes had the impotent, stricken look of one who has searched dim distances for some beloved object—and searched in vain.

He did not glance round. His temper was on edge. With a fierce movement he pulled open the door and departed. And behind him like a veil there fell the silence of a great despair.



CHAPTER IV

THE NEW HOME

A small figure was already standing outside the station when the car Sir Eustace drove whirled round the corner of the station yard. He was greeted by the waving of a vigorous hand, as he dashed up, grinding on the brakes in the last moment as was his impetuous custom. Everyone knew him from afar by his driving, and the village children were wont to scatter like rabbits at his approach.

Dinah however stood her ground with a confidence which his wild performance hardly justified, and the moment he alighted sprang to meet him with the eagerness of a child escaped from school.

"Oh, Eustace, it is fun coming here! I was so horribly afraid something would stop me just at the last. But everything has turned out all right, and we are going to have ever such a fine wedding with crowds and crowds of people. Did you know Isabel wrote and said she would give me my wedding dress? Isn't it dear of her? How is she now?"

"Where is your luggage?" said Eustace.

She pointed to a diminutive dress-basket behind her. "That's all there is. I'm not to stay more than a week as the time is getting so short I don't feel as if I shall ever be ready as it is. I've never been so rushed before. I sometimes wonder if it wouldn't be almost better to put it off a few weeks."

"Jump up!" commanded Eustace, with a curt sign to a porter to pick up his fiancee's humble impediments.

Dinah sprang up beside him and slipped a shy hand onto his knee. "You look more like Apollo than ever," she whispered, awe-struck, "when you frown like that. Is anything the matter?"

His brow cleared magically at her action. "I began to think I should have to come down to Perrythorpe and fetch you," he said, grasping the little nervous fingers. "I thought you meant to give me the slip—if you could."

"Oh no!" said Dinah, shocked at the suggestion. "I wanted to come; only—only—I couldn't be spared sooner. It wasn't my fault," she urged pleadingly. "Truly it wasn't!"

He smiled upon her. "All right,—Daphne. I'll forgive you this time," he said. "But now I've got you, my nymph of the woods, I am not going to part with you again in a hurry. And if you talk of putting off the wedding again, I'll simply run away with you. So now you know what to expect."

Dinah uttered her giddy little laugh. The excitement of this visit—the first she had ever paid to anyone—had turned her head. "Do you know Rose is actually going to be my chief bridesmaid?" she said. "Isn't that—magnanimous of her? She is pretending to be pleased, but I know she is frightfully jealous underneath. The other bridesmaid is the Vicar's daughter. She is quite old, nearly thirty but I couldn't think of anyone else, except the infant schoolmistress, and they wouldn't let me have her. I shall feel rather small, shan't I? Even Rose is twenty-five. I wonder if I shall feel grown up when I'm married. Do you think I shall?"

"Not till you cease to be—Daphne," said Sir Eustace enigmatically.

He started the car with the words, and they shot forward with a suddenness that made Dinah hold her breath.

But in a few moments she was chattering again, for she was never quiet for long. How was Scott? Was he at home? And Isabel—he hadn't told her. She did hope dear Isabel was keeping better. Was she? Was she?

She pressed the question as he did not seem inclined to answer it, and saw again the frown that had darkened his handsome face upon arrival.

"Do tell me!" she begged. "Isn't she so well?"

And at last with the curtness of speech which always denoted displeasure with him, he made reply.

"No, she has gone back a good deal since she got home. She lies on a sofa and broods all day long. I am looking to you to wake her up. For heaven's sake be as lively as you can!"

"Oh, poor Isabel!" Quick concern was in Dinah's voice. "What is it, do you think? Doesn't the place suit her?"

"Heaven knows," he answered gloomily, "I have a house down at Heath-on-Sea where we keep the yacht, but I doubt if it would do her much good to go there this time of the year. She and Scott might try it later—after the wedding."

"Couldn't we all go there?" suggested Dinah ingenuously.

He gave her a keen glance. "For the honeymoon? No I don't think so," he said.

"Only for the first part of it," said Dinah coaxingly; "till Isabel felt better."

He uttered a brief laugh. "No, thanks, Daphne. We're going to be alone—quite alone, for the first part of our honeymoon. I am going to take you in this car to the most out-of-the-way corner in England, where—even, if you run away—there'll be nowhere to run to. And there you'll stay till—" he paused a moment—"you realize that you are all mine for ever and ever, till in fact, you've shed all your baby nonsense and become a wise little married woman."

Dinah gave a sudden sharp shiver, and pulled her coat closer about her.

He glanced at her again. "You'll like it better than being a maid-of-all-work," he said, with his swift, transforming smile.

She smiled back at him with ready responsiveness. "Oh, I shall! I'm sure I shall. I've always wanted to be married—always. Only—it'll seem a little funny, just at first. You won't get impatient with me, will you, if—if sometimes I forget how to behave?"

He laughed and abruptly slackened speed. They were running down a narrow lane bordered with bare trees through which the spring sunshine filtered down. On a brown upland to one side of them a plough was being driven. On the other the ground sloped away to deep meadows where wound a willow-banked river.

The car stopped. "How pretty it is!" said Dinah.

And then very suddenly she found that it was not for the sake of the view that he had brought her to a standstill in that secluded place. For he caught her to him with the hot ardour she had learned to dread and kissed with passion the burning face she sought to hide.

She struggled for a few seconds like a captured bird, but in the end she yielded palpitating, as she had yielded so often before, mutely bearing that which her whole soul clamoured inarticulately to escape. When he let her go, her cheeks were on fire. He was laughing, but she was on the verge of tears.

He started on again without words, and in a very brief space they were racing forward at terrific speed, seeming scarcely to touch the ground so rapid was their progress.

Dinah sat with her two hands clutched upon her hat, thankful for the cold rush of air that gave her relief after the fiery intensity of those unsparing kisses. Her heart was beating in great thumps. Somehow the fierceness of him always exceeded either memory or expectation. He was so terribly strong, so disconcertingly absolute in his demands upon her. And every time he seemed to take more.