a threw it impatiently wide. She
stood a second on the threshold staring at them. Then: "Are you never
coming in?" she said. "I thought--I thought--" she stammered suddenly and
turned white. "Edward!" she said, and went back a step as if something
had frightened her.

Dick instantly went forward to her. "Yes, Mrs. Fielding. We're coming
now," he said. "Awfully sorry to have kept you waiting. We've had things
to talk about, but we've just about done. You're coming, aren't you, sir?
Take my arm, I say! You look tired."

He offered and she accepted almost instinctively. Her hand trembled on
his arm as they left the room, and he suddenly and very impulsively laid
his own upon it.

It was a protective impulse that moved him, but a moment later he
adjusted the position by asking a favour of her--for the first time in
the whole of their acquaintance.

"Mrs. Fielding, please, after to-day--give me the privilege of numbering
myself among your friends!"

She looked at him oddly, seeking to cover her agitation with a quivering
assumption of her old arrogance. But something in his face deterred her.
It was not this man's way to solicit favours, and somehow, since he had
humbled himself to ask, she had it not in her to refuse.

"Very well, Dick," she said, faintly smiling. "I grant you that."

"Thank you," he said, and gently released her hand.

It was the swiftest and one of the most complete victories of his life.

CHAPTER III

CONFESSION

It was nearly two hours later that Vera sitting alone before her fire
turned with a slight start at the sound of her husband's step in the room
beyond. She was wearing a pale silk dressing-gown and her hair hung in a
single plait over her shoulder, giving her a curiously girlish look. The
slimness of her figure as she leaned among the cushions accentuated the
fragility which her recent illness had stamped upon her. Her eyes were
ringed with purple, and they had a startled expression that the sound of
the squire's step served to intensify. At the soft turning of the handle
she made a movement that was almost of shrinking. And when he entered she
looked up at him with a small pinched smile from which all pleasure was
wholly absent.

He was still in evening dress, and the subdued light falling upon him
gave him the look of a man still scarcely past his prime. He stood for a
moment, erect and handsome, before he quietly closed the door behind him
and moved forward.

"Still u