half-hearted
people. They come to no good. If you repel them they are mortally
offended and withdraw, and if you welcome them they are terrified and
withdraw."

"I don't think Wentworth intends withdrawing."

"No. These meetings look as if he had unconsciously drifted with the
current till the rowing back would be somewhat arduous." There was a
moment's silence, in which Magdalen recalled certain lofty sentiments
which Wentworth had aired with suspicious frequency of late. She knew
that when he talked of his consciousness of guidance by a Higher Power
in the important decisions of his life he always meant following the
line of least resistance. In this case the line of least resistance
_might_ tend towards marriage.

"It never struck me as possible till now," she said aloud, "that Fay
would think seriously of him."

"I don't suppose she is. She is only keeping her hand in. Don't you
remember how cruel she was to that poor Mr. Bell."

"I am convinced that she is not keeping her hand in."

"Then you actually favour the idea of a marriage." Bessie got up and
stalked slowly to the door. "You will help it on?" she said over her
shoulder.

"No." Magdalen's voice shook a little. "I will do nothing to help it, or
to hinder it."

CHAPTER XXI

The dawn broke dim on Rose Mary's soul--
No hill-crown's heavenly aureole,
But a wild gleam on a shaken shoal.

--D. G. ROSSETTI.

If Fay's progress through life could have been drawn with a pencil it
would have resembled the ups and downs, like the teeth of a saw, of a
fever chart.

To Magdalen it appeared as if Fay could undergo the same feelings with
the same impotent results of remorse or depression a hundred times. They
seemed to find her the same and leave her the same. But nevertheless she
did move, imperceptibly, unconsciously--no, not quite unconsciously. The
sense--common to all weak natures--not of being guided, but of being
pushed was upon her.

Once again she tried to extricate herself from the pressure of some
mysterious current. There seemed no refuge left in Magdalen. There
seemed very few comfortable people left in the world, to whom a
miserable woman might turn. Only Wentworth. _He did not know._

Perhaps Fay would never have turned to him if she had not first confided
in and then shrunk from Magdalen. For the second time in her life she
longed feverishly to get away from home, the home to which only a year
ago she had been so g