d, and offered her hand. He held it very lightly, looking at
her with his blue eyes, which indeed expressed a profound melancholy.

'Thank you,' he murmured. 'Thank you for your great kindness.'

And thereupon he opened the front door for her. Without another look
Monica went quickly down the stairs; she appreciated his motive for not
accompanying her to the exit.

* * * * * * * * * *

Before entering the house she had managed to conceal the sheet of music
which she was carrying. But, happily, Widdowson was still absent. Half
an hour passed--half an hour of brooding and reverie--before she heard
his footstep ascending the stairs. On the landing she met him with a
pleasant smile.

'Have you enjoyed your drive?'

'Pretty well.'

'And do you feel better?'

'Not much, dear. But it isn't worth talking about.'

Later, he inquired where she had been.

'I had an appointment with Milly Vesper.'

The first falsehood she had ever told him, and yet uttered with such
perfect assumption of sincerity as would have deceived the acutest
observer. He nodded, discontented as usual, but entertaining no doubt.

And from that moment she hated him. If he had plied her with
interrogations, if he had seemed to suspect anything, the burden of
untruth would have been more endurable. His simple acceptance of her
word was the sternest rebuke she could have received. She despised
herself, and hated him for the degradation which resulted from his
lordship over her.

CHAPTER XXI

TOWARDS THE DECISIVE

Mary Barfoot had never suffered from lack of interest in life. Many a
vivid moment dwelt in her memory; joys and sorrows, personal or of
larger scope, affected her the more deeply because of that ruling
intelligence which enabled her to transmute them into principles. No
longer anticipating or desiring any great change in her own
environment, in the modes and motives of her activity, she found it a
sufficient happiness to watch, and when possible to direct, the
tendency of younger lives. So kindly had nature tempered her
disposition, that already she had been able to outlive those fervours
of instinct which often make the middle life of an unwedded woman one
long repining; but her womanly sympathies remained. And at present
there was going forward under her own roof, within her daily
observation, a comedy, a drama, which had power to excite all her
disinterested emotions. It had been in progress for twelve months, and
now, un