t was
a bitter thing to realise, but it made her more than ever certain that
there was a secret to be disclosed.

After breakfast the Sunday morning routine of a country house began.
She and Arthur walked together over the fields to church. The whole
country breathed a lazy atmosphere of early summer. Its beauty and its
placidity mocked her. Before them went the Considines. He wore a long
cassock that swept the grass, as they went, while Gabrielle walked in
silence at his side. Never once in their journey did she look back.
It struck Mrs. Payne for the first time how young she was, how very
much younger and more supple than her husband. And yet they seemed to
be happy.

The service was the usual slow ceremony of a village church, Considine
moving with the dignity of his vestments from the lectern and the altar
to the organ seat which he also occupied. Arthur, standing or kneeling
at his mother's side, appeared to be properly engrossed in the service.
Singing the psalms beside him she became aware how much of a man he was
now, for his voice, that had been cracking for several years, had now
sunk to a deep and sonorous bass.

It was not until Considine ascended the pulpit and began to preach,
that Mrs. Payne became conscious of anything extraordinary. At first
she was held by the sermon, which was unusually well constructed, but
in the middle of it she became aware that Arthur was not listening. He
sat straight in the pew beside her as though he were intent on the
preacher, but all the time his eyes were wandering to the other side of
the aisle. Mrs. Payne tried to follow their direction. Here,
presumably, was a fairly representative collection of the female
inhabitants of the village. Here she might expect to find the farmer's
daughter, or, in the last emergency, the housemaid, on whom his
affections were centred. She heard no more of Considine, only watching
Arthur's eyes, and watching, she soon discovered that these were for
Mrs. Considine and her alone. She could not deny the fact that
Gabrielle, with her fine pale profile set against a pillar of grey
sandstone, was a creature of amazing beauty. She herself was
fascinated by this vision of refinement and grace to such a degree that
she almost shared in Arthur's rapture.

For a little while she could not be sure of it, for this was the last
possibility that had entered her mind: but at last it seemed that
Gabrielle became conscious of the gaze that