he winced under it--in a sense, resented it--none
the less.

And all the time he never ceased to be conscious of the newspaper in his
breast-pocket, and of that faint pencilled line that seemed to burn
against his heart.

Would she shrink from him, finally and irrevocably, if she knew it? Once
or twice he looked at her curiously, wondering at the power that women
have of filling and softening a situation. Her broken talk of Ferrier
was the only possible talk that could have arisen between them at that
moment without awkwardness, without risk. To that last ground of
friendship she could still admit him, and a wounded self-love suggested
that she chose it for his sake as well as Ferrier's.

Of course, she had seen him with Alicia, and must have drawn her
conclusions. Four months after the breach with her!--and such a breach!
As he walked beside her through the radiant scented garden, with its
massed roses and delphiniums, its tangle of poppy and lupin, he suddenly
beheld himself as a kind of outcast--distrusted and disliked by an old
friend like Chide, separated forever from the good opinion of this girl
whom he had loved, suspected even by his mother, and finally crushed by
this unexpected tragedy, and by the shock of Barrington's
unpardonable behavior.

Then his whole being reacted in a fierce protesting irritation. He had
been the victim of circumstance as much as she. His will hardened to a
passionate self-defence; he flung off, he held at bay, an anguish that
must and should be conquered. He had to live his life. He would live it.

They passed into the orchard, where, amid the old trees, covered with
tiny green apples, some climbing roses were running at will, hanging
their trails of blossom, crimson and pale pink, from branch to branch.
Linnets and blackbirds made a pleasant chatter; the grass beneath the
trees was rich and soft, and through their tops, one saw white clouds
hovering in a blazing blue.

Diana turned suddenly toward the house.

"I think we may go back now," she said, and her hand contracted and her
lip, as though she realized that her dear dead friend had left her
roof forever.

They hurried back, but there was still time for conversation.

"You knew him, of course, from a child?" she said to him, glancing at
him with timid interrogation.

In reply he forced himself to play that part of Ferrier's
intimate--almost son--which, indeed, she had given him, by implication,
throughout her own t