happened to be
nearer, Philip or her mother. And she saw to it that one of them was
always near.

It was the frequency of these sudden, unexplained attacks of frantic
affection that had driven Philip to the necessity of another study,
where he might write sermons and attend to necessary matters free from
the distraction of a wife who at any moment might fling herself into his
arms demanding wordlessly to be comforted.

Not that he begrudged the little bruised soul any comfort he had to
offer. He at least had gone into marriage with his eyes wide open. He
understood Jacqueline far better than did her mother, who ascribed her
varying moods to the whims and megrims usual with young wives in the
first difficult year or two of married life.

Frequently these panics occurred at night, when she suddenly found
herself awake in the black loneliness, remembering Channing. Then she
would jump out of bed and run into her husband's room, a distraught,
white ghost of a figure, and climb in beside him to hide her head in the
ready refuge of his shoulder.

"Nightmares again?" he would ask.

And she, nodding, buried her head deeper, while he held her close and
silent until her shuddering ceased, and he knew by her light breathing
that she was asleep there in his arms.

Perhaps it was a comforting that worked both ways, for Philip sometimes
had nightmares of his own.

One day Jacqueline, after lunch with her mother, was glancing over the
numerous magazines that littered the reading-table, when she came across
something which riveted her attention. Kate, getting no answer to a
twice-repeated question, looked over her shoulder to see what she was
reading. On the front page she saw a picture of Percival Channing, with
a notice of his new book, just published.

"He finished it without me after all, you see," said Jacqueline faintly.
"He--he said he couldn't."

Kate made no comment. The mention of Channing always embarrassed her
quite as much as it did Jacqueline. Her duplicity in the matter of his
disappearance weighed heavily on her conscience, and she longed for the
time to come when she could make full confession and be absolved. She
wondered if the time had come already, since Jacqueline spoke of him of
her own accord.

"I suppose I ought to be proud to have helped at all with such a book as
that," went on the girl, haltingly. "It says here it is the greatest
book he has ever written.--And I'm in it, Mother. It's a great hon