She did not worship him, she made no pretence of it. Her cold, pale
beauty had not so much power over him as formerly, but it still
chagrined him keenly as often as he was reminded that he had no
high place in his wife's judgment. He knew well enough that it was
impossible for her to: admire him; he was conscious of the thousand
degrading things he had said and done, every one of them stored in
her memory. Perhaps not once since that terrible day in the Pentonville
lodgings had he looked her straight in the eyes. Yes, her beauty
appealed to him less than even a year ago; Adela knew it, and it was the
one solace in her living death. Perhaps occasion could again have stung
him into jealousy, but Adela was no longer a vital interest in his
existence. He lived in external things, his natural life. Passion had
been an irregularity in his development. Yet he would gladly have had
his wife's sympathy. He neither loved nor hated her, but she was for
ever above him, and, however unconsciously, he longed for her regard.
Irreproachable, reticent, it might be dying, Adela would no longer
affect interests she did not feel. To these present words of his she
replied only with a grave, not unkind, look; a look he could not under
stand, yet which humbled rather than irritated him.

The servant opened the door and announced a visitor--'Mr. Hilary.'

Mutimer seemed struck with a thought as he heard the name.

'The very man!' he exclaimed below his breath, with a glance at Adela.
'Just run off and let us have this room. My luck won't desert me, see if
it does!'

CHAPTER XXXII

Mr. Willis Rodman scarcely relished the process which deprived him
of his town house and of the greater part of his means, but his
exasperation happily did not seek vent for itself in cruelty to his
wife. It might very well have done so, would all but certainly, had not
Alice appealed to his sense of humour by her zeal in espousing his cause
against her brother. That he could turn her round his finger was an old
experience, but to see her spring so actively to arms on his behalf,
when he was conscious that she had every excuse for detesting him, and
even abandoning him, struck him as a highly comical instance of his
power over women, a power on which he had always prided himself. He
could not even explain it as self-interest in her; numberless things
proved the contrary. Alice was still his slave, though he had not given
himself the slightest trouble t