rriage waiting at the door, the
impatient horses chafing at their delay. What could have detained her?
"Wait for me one moment, Carr," he said. "Stop a cab if you see one."

He dashed up to the drawing-room; his wife was coming forth then, her
cloak and gloves on, her fan in her hand. "Maude, my darling," he
exclaimed, "what has kept you? Surely you have not waited for me?--you
did not misunderstand me?"

"I hardly know what has kept me," she evasively answered. "It is late,
but I'm going now."

It never occurred to Lord Hartledon that she had been watching or
listening. Incapable of any meanness of the sort, he could not suspect it
in another. Lady Hartledon's fertile brain had been suggesting a solution
of this mystery. It was rather curious, perhaps, that her suspicions
should take the same bent that her husband's did at first--that of
instituting law proceedings by Dr. Ashton.

She said nothing. Her husband led her out, placed her in the carriage,
and saw it drive away. Then he and the barrister got into a cab and went
to the Temple.

"We'll take the books home with us, Carr," he said, feverishly. "You
often have fellows dropping in to your chambers at night; at my house we
shall be secure from interruption."

It was midnight when Lady Hartledon returned home. She asked after her
husband, and heard that he was in the breakfast-room with Mr. Carr.

She went towards it with a stealthy step, and opened the door very
softly. Had Lord Hartledon not been talking, they might, however, have
heard her. The table was strewed with thick musty folios; but they
appeared to be done with, and Mr. Carr was leaning back in his chair with
folded arms.

"I have had nothing but worry all my life," Val was saying; "but compared
with this, whatever has gone before was as nothing. When I think of
Maude, I feel as if I should go mad."

"You must quietly separate from her," said Mr. Carr.

A slight movement. Mr. Carr stopped, and Lord Hartledon looked round.
Lady Hartledon was close behind him.

"Percival, what is the matter?" she asked, turning her back on Mr. Carr,
as if ignoring his presence. "What bad news did that parson bring you?--a
friend, I presume, of Dr. Ashton's."

They had both risen. Lord Hartledon glanced at Mr. Carr, the perspiration
breaking out on his brow. "It--it was not a parson," he said, in his
innate adherence to truth.

"I ask _you_, Lord Hartledon," she resumed, having noted the silent
appeal to Mr