tering upon his patrimony,
Horace Lord had advanced the sum necessary to repay what Nancy owed to
the Barmbys. However rich Horace was going to be, this debt to him must
be cancelled. On that, as on most other points, Tarrant and his wife
held a firm agreement of opinion. Yet they wanted money; the past year
had been a time of struggle to make ends meet. Neither was naturally
disposed to asceticism, and if they did not grumble it was only because
grumbling would have been undignified.

'Did you dine with the great people on Thursday?' Nancy asked.

'Yes, and rather enjoyed it. There were one or two clever women.'

'Been anywhere else?'

'An hour at a smoking-concert the other evening. Pippit, the actor,
was there, and recited a piece much better than I ever heard him speak
anything on the stage. They told me he was drunk; very possibly that
accounted for it.'

To a number of such details Nancy listened quietly, with bent head. She
had learned to put absolute faith in all that Tarrant told her of his
quasi-bachelor life; she suspected no concealment; but the monotony of
her own days lay heavy upon her whilst he talked.

'Won't you smoke?' she asked, rising from his knee to fetch the pipe and
tobacco-jar kept for him upon a shelf. Slippers also she brought him,
and would have unlaced his muddy boots had Tarrant permitted it. When
he presented a picture of masculine comfort, Nancy, sitting opposite,
cautiously approached a subject of which as yet there had been no word
between them.

'Oughtn't you to get more comfortable lodgings?'

'Oh, I do very well. I'm accustomed to the place, and I like the
situation.'

He had kept his room in Great College Street, though often obliged to
scant his meals as the weekly rent-day approached.

'Don't you think we might make some better--some more economical
arrangement?'

'How?'

Nancy took courage, and spoke her thoughts.

'It's more expensive to live separately than if we were together.'

Tarrant seemed to give the point his impartial consideration.

'H'm--no, I think not. Certainly not, with our present arrangements. And
even if it were we pay for your comfort, and my liberty.'

'Couldn't you have as much liberty if we were living under the same
roof? Of course I know that you couldn't live out here; it would put
a stop to your work at once. But suppose we moved. Mary might take a
rather larger house--it needn't be much larger--in a part convenient
for you. We sho