p and dashing back her hair
from her tear-stained cheeks. "I gave a boy half a crown this morning to
be at the station with it by eight o'clock. And I couldn't possibly
either write or telegraph last night--it was too late."

"Where were you?" said Ashe, slowly. "I went to the Alcots' this
morning, and--"

"--the butler told you Madeleine was in bed? So she is. She was ill
yesterday morning. There was no coach and no party. I went with
Geoffrey."

Kitty held herself erect; her eyes, from which the tears were
involuntarily dropping, were fixed on her husband.

"Of course I guessed that," said Ashe.

"It was Geoffrey brought me the news--here, just as I was starting to go
to the Alcots'. Then he said he had something to read me--and it would
be delicious to go to Pangbourne--spend the day on the river--and come
back from Windsor--at night--by train. And I had a horrid headache--and
it was so hot--and you were at the office"--her lip quivered--"and I
wanted to hear Geoffrey's poems--and so--"

She interrupted herself, and once more broke down--hiding her face
against the chair. But the next moment she felt herself roughly drawn
forward, as Ashe knelt beside her.

"Kitty!--look at me! That man behaved to you like a villain?"

She looked up--she saw the handsome, good-humored face transformed--and
wrenched herself away.

"He did," she said, bitterly--"like a villain." She began to twist and
torment her handkerchief as Ashe had seen her do once before, the small
white teeth pressed upon the lower lip--then suddenly she turned upon
him--

"I suppose you want me to tell you the story?"

All Kitty in the words! Her frankness, her daring, and the impatient,
realistic tone she was apt to impose upon emotion--they were all there.

Ashe rose and began to walk up and down.

"Tell me your part in it," he said, at last--"and as little of that
fellow as may be."

Kitty was silent. Ashe, looking at her, saw a curious shade of reverie,
a kind of dreamy excitement steal over her face.

"Go on, Kitty!" he said, sharply. Then, restraining himself, he added,
with all his natural courtesy--"I beg your pardon, Kitty, but the sooner
we get through with this the better."

The mist in which her expression had been for a moment wrapped fell
away. She flushed deeply.

"I told you I had done nothing vile!" she said, passionately. "Did you
believe me?"

Their eyes met in a shock of challenge and reply.

"Those things are not