of the watch had stepped in to see Ralph as he sat at supper,
and had gone again saying the dog deserved it for daring to lift his
voice against the King and his will.

But above all Ralph repented of his own words. There was no harm in
saying such things in the country; but it was foolish and rash to do so
in town. Cromwell's men should be silent and discreet, he knew, not
street-orators; and if he had had time to think he would not have
spoken. However the crowd was with him; there was plainly no one of any
importance there; it was unlikely that Cromwell himself would hear of
the incident; and perhaps after all no harm was done.

Meanwhile there was Beatrice to reckon with, and Ralph laid down his pen
a dozen times that morning and rehearsed once more what he would have to
say to her.

He was shrewd enough to know that it was his personality and not his
virtues or his views that had laid hold of this girl's soul. As it was
with him, so it was with her; each was far enough apart from the other
in all external matters; such things had been left behind a year ago; it
was not an affair of consonant tastes, but of passion. From each there
had looked deep inner eyes; there had been on either side a steady and
fearless scrutiny, and then the two souls had leapt together in a bright
flame of desire, knowing that each was made for the other. There had
been so little love-making, so few speeches after the first meeting or
two, so few letters exchanged, and fewer embraces. The last veils had
fallen at the fury of Chris's intervention, and they had known then what
had been inevitable all along.

Ralph smiled to himself as he remembered how little he had said or she
had answered; there had been no need to say anything. And then his eyes
grew wide and passionate, and his hands gripped one another fiercely, as
the memory died, and the burning flame of desire flared within him again
from the deep well he bore in his heart. The world of affairs and
explanations and evasions faded into twilight, and there was but one
thing left, his love and hers. It was to that that he would appeal.

He sat so a moment longer, and then took up his pen again, though it
shook in his hand, and went on with his reckonings.

* * * * *

He was perfectly composed half an hour later as he went downstairs to
meet her. He had finished his line of figures sedately when the man
looked in to say that she was below; and had sat