she had been the principal figure in it, and that to the whole
world she must seem an object for derision and contempt. It was not her
fault that she had played a false part in life. But nevertheless she
had played it, and it was not likely that many would believe her
innocent. The thought of appealing to the Duke, or to Andrew de la
Borne, for help, made her cheeks burn with shame. In any ordinary
trouble she would have gone to them. This, however, was something too
humiliating, too impossible. She felt that it was a blow which she
could ask no one to share.

The omnibus rolled on eastwards and reached Liverpool Street. A sudden
overwhelming impulse decided Jeanne as to her destination. She
remembered that peculiar sense of freedom, that first escape from her
cramped surroundings, which had come to her walking upon the marshes of
Salthouse. She would go there again, if it was only for a day or two;
find rooms somewhere in the village, and write to Monsieur Laplanche
from there. Visitors she knew were not uncommon in the little seaside
village, and she would easily be able to keep out of the way of Cecil,
if he were still there. The idea seemed to her like an inspiration. She
went up to the ticket-office and asked for a ticket for Salthouse. The
man stared at her.

"Never heard of the place, miss," he said. "It's not on our line."

"It is near Wells on the east coast," she said. "Now I think of it, I
remember one has to drive from Wells. Can I have a ticket to there?"

He glanced at the clock.

"The train goes in ten minutes, miss," he said.

Jeanne travelled first, because she had never thought of travelling any
other way. She sat in the corner of an empty carriage, looking steadily
out of the window, and seeing nothing but the fragments of her little
life. Now that she was detached from it, she seemed to realize how
little real pleasure she had found in the life which the Princess had
insisted upon dragging her into. She remembered how every man whom she
had met addressed her with the same EMPRESSEMENT, how their eyes seemed
to have followed her about almost covetously, how the girls had openly
envied her, how the court of the men had been so monotonous and so
unreal. She drew a little breath, almost of relief. When she was used
to the idea she might even be glad that this great fortune had taken to
itself wings and flitted away. She was no longer the heiress of untold
wealth. She was simply a girl, standing on