his life he would have been glad of
help from someone who knew a little about the motive of human beings. He
was worried, distressed, perplexed; slowly his temper was rising--a
temper roused by his irritation at not being able to deal with the
situation.

It was not his way to ask for help from anyone and he always had all the
inarticulate self-confidence of the healthy Englishman, but now, as the
days crept towards Christmas he was increasingly aware that something
must soon happen to prevent his patience giving away.

He might as well not be married to Rachel at all--and that was an
intolerable position for him as husband, as lover, as master of his
house. Beyond doubt, he knew Rachel less now than he had known her when
he married her. Her very kindness to him, her strange alternations of
silence and affection perplexed him; for a long time he had told
himself that he knew that she did not love him and that he must make
companionship do, but ever since that quarrel about Nita Raseley the
division between them had grown wider and wider.

Because he loved her he had been very patient with her--very patient for
Roddy, who had always had what he wanted and shown temper if he were
refused.

But Roddy's character was of a very real simplicity. The men and women
and animals whom he had known had also been, for the most part, of a
simple character and, in all his life, there had only been one horse and
two women who had been too much for him, and even these, at the last, he
had beaten by temper and dogged determination.

Rachel was utterly beyond him. The strange way that she had of suddenly
becoming quite another woman baffled him; had he only not loved her he
was sure that it would have been easier, much easier.

But now, as the days passed at Seddon, his irritation thrived. Women
were all the same. They _seemed_ obstinate enough, but there was nothing
like brute force to bring them to heel. He was growing surly--cross with
the servants and the animals. He didn't sleep. His discontent made him
silent so that, when they were alone, instead of talking to her and
interesting her and winning her, perhaps, in that way, he would sit and
look at her and answer her in monosyllables, and, afterwards, would be
furious with himself for behaving so absurdly.

This trouble sent him out of doors and away over the Downs on his horse.
Fiercely he hurled himself into his fields and lanes and farms, getting
up sometimes very early an