situation. And his resolve had need
to be very keen, for just then Eve did a thing which might have
wrecked it. She rose and came straight towards him; her pretty,
distressed face was raised to his, still, in spite of its womanly
anguish, with some of the pleading of a frightened child, who runs
instinctively in its extremity to the person whom it knows best; and
she gave him her two little trembling hands, which he held for a
moment silently.

"Philip," she said, in a low, constrained voice--"Philip, I have
known you all my life--longer than anyone. You were always good to
me. Tell me whether it's true or not what this woman has told me.
Philip, I shall die if this be true!"

He bent his head for a moment. He had a wild longing to give up,
simply to clasp her in his arms and console her with kisses and
incoherent words of tenderness, as he had done years ago, when she
was a very small child, and ran to him with her tear-stained cheeks,
after a difficulty with her governess. But he only put her away from
him very quietly and sadly.

"It is not true," he said quietly, "if it is anything against your
husband."

The girl on the sofa, Kitty Crichton, rose; she made a step forward
irresolutely, seemed on the point of speaking, but something in
Rainham's eyes coerced her, and Eve was crying. He continued very
fast and low, as though he told with difficulty some shameful story,
learnt by rote.

"I tell you it is not true. Lightmark," he added sternly, "there has
been a mistake--you see that--for which I apologize. Wake up, for
God's sake! Come and see after your wife; some slander has upset
her. This woman is--mine; I will take her away."

The girl trembled violently; she appeared fascinated, terrified into
a passive obedience by Rainham's imperious eyes, which burnt in his
white face like the eyes of a dying man. She followed, half
unconsciously, his beckoning hand. But Eve confronted her before she
reached the door.

"Whom am I to believe?" she cried scornfully. "Why did you say it?
What was the good of it--a lie like that? It is a lie, I suppose?"

"Yes, yes!" said the girl hysterically, "it seems so. Oh, let me go,
madam! I'm sorry I told you. I'll trouble nobody much longer. Call
it a lie."

She threw out her hands helplessly; she would have fallen, but
Rainham caught her wrist, drew her toward him, supporting her with
an arm.

"Come," he said firmly, "this is no place for us."

Eve regarded them all str