ess, from
which issued vivid illuminations of the one means of certain escape; an
abhorrent hissing cavern, that led to a place named Liberty, her refuge,
but a hectic place.

Unable to write, hating the house which held her a fixed mark for these
attacks, she had an idea of flying straight to her beloved Lugano lake,
and there hiding, abandoning her friends, casting off the slave's name
she bore, and living free in spirit. She went so far as to reckon the
cost of a small household there, and justify the violent step by an
exposition of retrenchment upon her large London expenditure. She had but
to say farewell to Emma, no other tie to cut! One morning on the
Salvatore heights would wash her clear of the webs defacing and
entangling her.

CHAPTER XXIV

INDICATES A SOUL PREPARED FOR DESPERATION

The month was August, four days before the closing of Parliament, and
Diana fancied it good for Arthur Rhodes to run down with her to Copsley.
He came to her invitation joyfully, reminding her of Lady Dunstane's wish
to hear some chapters of THE CANTATRICE, and the MS. was packed. They
started, taking rail and fly, and winding up the distance on foot. August
is the month of sober maturity and majestic foliage, songless, but a
crowned and royal-robed queenly month; and the youngster's appreciation
of the homely scenery refreshed Diana; his delight in being with her was
also pleasant. She had no wish to exchange him for another; and that was
a strengthening thought.

At Copsley the arrival of their luggage had prepared the welcome. Warm
though it was, Diana perceived a change in Emma, an unwonted reserve, a
doubtfulness of her eyes, in spite of tenderness; and thus thrown back on
herself, thinking that if she had followed her own counsel (as she called
her impulse) in old days, there would have been no such present misery,
she at once, and unconsciously, assumed a guarded look. Based on her
knowledge of her honest footing, it was a little defiant. Secretly in her
bosom it was sharpened to a slight hostility by the knowledge that her
mind had been straying. The guilt and the innocence combined to clothe
her in mail, the innocence being positive, the guilt so vapoury. But she
was armed only if necessary, and there was no requirement for armour.
Emma did not question at all. She saw the alteration in her Tony: she was
too full of the tragic apprehensiveness, overmastering her to speak of
trifles. She had never confided to