to Mrs. Glenarm?"

It was simply and modestly said--with an unaffected and touching
resignation of look and manner. Julius gave her back the respect and the
sympathy which, for a moment, he had unjustly withheld from her.

"You have placed a confidence in me," he said "which most persons in
your situation would have withheld. I feel bound, in return to place
confidence in you. I will take it for granted that your motive in
this matter is one which it is my duty to respect. It will be for Mrs.
Glenarm to say whether she wishes the interview to take place or not.
All that I can do is to leave you free to propose it to her. You _are_
free."

As he spoke the sound of the piano reached them from the music-room.
Julius pointed to the glass door which opened on to the terrace.

"You have only to go in by that door," he said, "and you will find Mrs.
Glenarm alone."

Anne bowed, and left him. Arrived at the short flight of steps which led
up to the door, she paused to collect her thoughts before she went in.

A sudden reluctance to go on and enter the room took possession of
her, as she waited with her foot on the lower step. The report of Mrs.
Glenarm's contemplated marriage had produced no such effect on her as
Sir Patrick had supposed: it had found no love for Geoffrey left to
wound, no latent jealousy only waiting to be inflamed. Her object in
taking the journey to Perth was completed when her correspondence with
Geoffrey was in her own hands again. The change of purpose which
had brought her to Swanhaven was due entirely to the new view of her
position toward Mrs. Glenarm which the coarse commonsense of Bishopriggs
had first suggested to her. If she failed to protest against Mrs.
Glenarm's marriage, in the interests of the reparation which Geoffrey
owed to her, her conduct would only confirm Geoffrey's audacious
assertion that she was a married woman already. For her own sake
she might still have hesitated to move in the matter. But Blanche's
interests were concerned as well as her own; and, for Blanche's sake,
she had resolved on making the journey to Swanhaven Lodge.

At the same time, feeling toward Geoffrey as she felt now--conscious as
she was of not really desiring the reparation on which she was about
to insist--it was essential to the preservation of her own self-respect
that she should have some purpose in view which could justify her to her
own conscience in assuming the character of Mrs. Glenarm's riv