he
direction of some sheets of manuscript that lay upon the blotting-paper.
"I have a heavy night's work before me with that alone. My excuses have
already been telephoned to Lady Hannah."

"Owen!"----

She spoke his name in a whisper.

--"Owen!"

"Yes?"

"Couldn't I?--would you care to have me?--may I stay and dine at home with
you?"

"And disappoint your friends!... Most certainly not. Unless, indeed"--his
tone warmed to interest--"unless you are not feeling well?"

"I am perfectly well, thanks!" she said coldly.

"Then go to your dinner and your play, child," said Saxham, with the smile
that changed and softened his harsh features almost into beauty. "I will
drive with you to The Carlton, and fetch you from the play. Which of the
theatres have you decided to patronise?"

"Lady Hannah and the Major left the choice to me," she said, with a little
touch of girlish importance, "so I telephoned to Nickalls in Bond Street
for a box at The Leicester. He had not got one; he sent me three stalls
for 'The Chiffon Girl' at The Variety instead. It is a revival. I don't
quite know what that means," she added, rather puzzled by Saxham's silence
and the grimness of his face. "You do not mind at all? You do not think it
is the kind of play the Mother would not have liked me to see?"

"No!" said Saxham curtly, and with averted eyes.

She bent her head to him as he opened the door, and went away to her own
rooms on the floor above, the drawing-room that was upholstered and hung
with delicate, green-and-white, rose-garlanded Pompadour brocade, and
graceful water-colours from famous hands, and furnished with every luxury
and elegance that the heart of woman could desire; the charming boudoir,
pink as a sea-shell, and full of new books and old china; the bedroom,
with the blue-and-white decorations, where an ivory Crucifix that had
always stood upon the Mother's writing-table hung above the dainty bed....

"I think he is a little hard on me at times," she said, as she passed
through the warm, firelit, perfumed rooms that were fragrant with the
narcissi and violets and lilies that were sent in by his orders, and
strewn with the costly, pretty trifles that she, who had been used to the
barrack-like bareness of the Convent, delighted in like a child, and the
gleaming mirrors gave her back her loveliness. "He treats me as if I were
a stranger. And, after all, I am his wife...."

Saxham's patients found him even curter and mor