you prefer breakfasting by yourself?" he said.

"If you please," she answered, faintly.

"Wait a minute. I have something to say before you go."

She waited. He considered with himself; consulting his memory--visibly,
unmistakably, consulting it before he spoke again.

"I have had the night to think in," he said. "The night has made a new
man of me. I beg your pardon for what I said yesterday. I was not myself
yesterday. I talked nonsense yesterday. Please to forget it, and forgive
it. I wish to turn over a new leaf and make amends--make amends for
my past conduct. It shall be my endeavor to be a good husband. In the
presence of Mrs. Dethridge, I request you to give me a chance. I won't
force your inclinations. We are married--what's the use of regretting
it? Stay here, as you said yesterday, on your own terms. I wish to make
it up. In the presence of Mrs. Dethridge, I say I wish to make it up. I
won't detain you. I request you to think of it. Good-morning."

He said those extraordinary words like a slow boy saying a hard
lesson--his eyes on the ground, his fingers restlessly fastening and
unfastening a button on his waistcoat.

Anne left the room. In the passage she was obliged to wait, and support
herself against the wall. His unnatural politeness was horrible; his
carefully asserted repentance chilled her to the soul with dread.
She had never felt--in the time of his fiercest anger and his foulest
language--the unutterable horror of him that she felt now.

Hester Dethridge came out, closing the door behind her. She looked
attentively at Anne--then wrote on her slate, and held it out, with
these words on it:

"Do you believe him?"

Anne pushed the slate away, and ran up stairs. She fastened the
door--and sank into a chair.

"He is plotting something against me," she said to herself. "What?"

A sickening, physical sense of dread--entirely new in her experience of
herself--made her shrink from pursuing the question. The sinking at her
heart turned her faint. She went to get the air at the open window.

At the same moment there was a ring at the gate bell. Suspicious of any
thing and every thing, she felt a sudden distrust of letting herself be
seen. She drew back behind the curtain and looked out.

A man-servant, in livery, was let in. He had a letter in his hand.
He said to the girl as he passed Anne's window, "I come from Lady
Holchester; I must see Mr. Delamayn instantly."

They went in. There was an