met at the East Tunbridge station at
ten; and Mrs. Flint, still convalescent, had dined in her sitting room.
Victoria sat opposite her guest in the big dining room, and Mr. Rangely
pronounced the occasion decidedly jolly. He had, he proclaimed, with the
exception of Mr. Vane's deplorable accident, never spent a better day in
his life.

Victoria wondered at her own spirits, which were feverish, as she
listened to transatlantic gossip about girls she had known who had
married Mr. Rangely's friends, and stories of Westminster and South
Africa, and certain experiences of Mr. Rangely's at other places
than Leith on the American continent, which he had grown sufficiently
confidential to relate. At times, lifting her eyes to him as he sat
smoking after dinner on the other side of the library fire, she almost
doubted his existence. He had come into her life at one o'clock that
day--it seemed an eternity since. And a subconscious voice, heard but
not heeded, told her that in the awakening from this curious dream he
would be associated in her memory with tragedy, just as a tune or a book
or a game of cards reminds one of painful periods of one's existence.
To-morrow the--episode would be a nightmare; to-night her one desire was
to prolong it.

And poor Mr. Rangely little imagined the part he was playing--as little
as he deserved it. Reluctant to leave, propriety impelled him to ask for
a trap at ten, and it was half past before he finally made his exit from
the room with a promise to pay his respects soon--very soon.

Victoria stood before the fire listening to the sound of the wheels
gradually growing fainter, and her mind refused to work. Hanover Street,
Mr. Jenney's farm-house, were unrealities too. Ten minutes later--if
she had marked the interval--came the sound of wheels again, this time
growing louder. Then she heard a voice in the hall, her father's voice.

"Towers, who was that?"

"A young gentleman, sir, who drove home with Miss Victoria. I didn't get
his name, sir."

"Has Miss Victoria retired?"

"She's in the library, sir. Here are some telegrams, Mr. Flint."

Victoria heard her father tearing open the telegrams and walking towards
the library with slow steps as he read them. She did not stir from her
place before the fire. She saw him enter and, with a characteristic
movement which had become almost habitual of late, crush the telegrams
in front of him with both hands.

"Well, Victoria?" he said.

"Well,