was still rocking
might have stopped it. He put his ear to it. Strange! It was going. And
it always stopped so easily, even if the housemaid dusted it.

Was it half-past two in the afternoon or in the night?

There was a band of sunshine across the floor and outside the gardens
and the downs were steeped in it.

Perhaps it was day.

The butler brought in a tray, and placed it near him.

"Have you had luncheon, sir?"

Wentworth thought a moment, and then said "yes."

"And will Mr. Michael return to-day, sir?"

Wentworth remembered some old, old prehistoric arrangement by which
Michael was to have come back with him to Barford this afternoon.

"No," he said, the room suddenly darkening till the sunshine on the
floor was barely visible. "No. He is not coming back."

The man hesitated a moment, and then left the room.

Wentworth groped for the flagon of whiskey, poured out a quantity, and
drank it raw. Then he waited for the nightmare to lift.

His mind cleared gradually. His scattered faculties came sneaking back
like defeated soldiers to camp. But they had all one tale of disaster
and one only to tell. He must needs believe them.

_Michael had tried to kill him._ Whatever else shifted that remained
true.

Wentworth bowed his stiffening head upon his hands, and the sweat ran
down his face.

Michael had tried to kill him, and had all but succeeded. Oh! if only he
had quite succeeded. If only his life had not come back to him! He had
died and died hard in that little room. And yet here he was still alive
and in agony.

Michael first. That thought was torture. Then Fay. That thought was
torture. The woman he had so worshipped, on whom he had lavished a
wealth of love, far greater than most men have it in them to bestow, had
deceived him, had been willing to be his brother's mistress.

Why had he ever believed in Fay and Michael? Had he not tacitly
distrusted men and women always from his youth up? Had he not gauged
life and love and friendship at their true value years ago? Why had he
made an exception of this particular man and woman? They were no worse
than the rest.

What was any man or woman worth? They were all false to the core. What
was Fay? A pretty piece of pink and white, a sensual lure like other
women, not better and not worse. And what was Michael but a man like
other men, ready to forget honour, morality, everything, if once his
passions were aroused. It was an old story, as old as the hil