t to her as she
had done to him. The events of the past few months passed before his
mind as on a clear mirror. He compared the gentle distinction of her
bearing with his own flaunting resentment.

"I am sorry," he said, "I have wronged you in thought and word and
action. The fact is, I never saw you plainly before; myself stood in
the way."

Mrs. Branscome barely heeded his words. The feelings her watchfulness
had hitherto restrained having once broken their barriers swept her
away on a full flow. She recalled the very terms of her letter. She
had written it in the room in which they were standing. Mr. Branscome
had called just as she addressed the envelope--she had questioned him
about its registration to Switzerland, and, yes, he had promised to
look after it and had taken it away. "Yes!" she repeated to herself
aloud, directing her eyes instinctively towards her husband's study
door. "He promised to post it."

The sound of the words and a sudden movement from Hilton woke her to
alarm. David had turned to the window, and she felt that he had heard
and understood. The silence pressed on her like a dead weight. For
Hilton, this was the crucial moment of his ordeal. He had understood
only too clearly, and this second proof of the harm a petty sin could
radiate struck through him the same fiery repulsion which had stung
him to revolt when he quitted Marston's rooms. He flung up the window
and faced the sunset. Strips of black cloud barred it across, and he
noticed, with a minute attention of which he was hardly conscious,
that their lower edges took a colour like the afterglow on a Swiss
rock mountain. The perception sent a riot of associations through his
brain which strengthened his wavering purpose. Must he lose her after
all, he thought; now that he had risen to a true estimation of her
worth? His fancy throned Kate queen of his mountain home, and he
turned towards her, but a light of fear in her eyes stopped the words
on his lips.

"I trust you," she said, simply.

The storm of his passions quieted down. That one sentence just
expressed to him the debt he owed to her. In return--well, he could do
no less than leave her her illusion.

"Good-bye," he said. "All the good that comes to us, somehow, seems to
spring from women like yourself, while we give you nothing but trouble
in return. Even this last misery, which my selfishness has brought to
you, lifts me to breathe a cleaner air."

"He must have forgotten