he wisdom."

When Sabina had gone, Miss Ironsyde nibbled a hot cake and reflected
deeply on an interview full of pain. The story--so fresh and terrific to
the teller--was older than the hills and presented no novel feature
whatever to her who listened. But in theory, Jenny Ironsyde entertained
very positive views concerning the trite situation. Whether she would be
able to sustain them before her nephew remained to be seen. She already
began to fear. She saw the dangers and traversed the arguments. Though
free from class prejudice, she recognised its weight in such a
situation. A break must mean Sabina's social ruin; but would union mean
ruin to Raymond? And if the problem was reduced to that, what became of
her theories? She decided that since her theories were based in
righteousness and justice, she must prefer his downfall to the woman's.
For if, indeed, he fell as the result of a mistaken marriage, he would
owe the fall to himself and his attitude after the event. He need not
fall. A tendency to judge him hardly, however, drew Jenny up. He had yet
to be heard.

She went to her writing-desk and wrote him a letter directing him to see
her on the following day without fail. "It is exceedingly important, my
dear boy," she said, "and I shall expect you not later than ten o'clock
to-morrow morning."

CHAPTER XVI

AT CHILCOMBE

Meantime Raymond had kept his promise and devoted some hours to
Estelle's pleasure. The girl was proud of such an event, anticipated it
for many days and won great delight from it when it came. She perceived,
as they started, that her friend was perturbed and wondered dimly a
moment as to what Sabina could have said to annoy him; but he appeared
to recover quickly and was calm, cheerful and attentive to her chatter
after they had gone a mile.

"To think you've never been to Chilcombe, Ray," she said. "You and
father go galloping after foxes, or shooting the poor pheasants and
partridges and don't care a bit for the wonderful tiny church at
Chilcombe--the tiniest in England almost, I do believe. And then there's
a beautiful thing in it--a splendid treasure; and many people think it
was a piece of one of the ships of the Spanish Armada, that was wrecked
on the Chesil Bank; and I dare say it is."

"You must tell me about it."

"I'm going to."

"Not walking too fast for you?"

"Not yet, but still you might go a little slower, or else I shall get
out of breath and shan't be able to