ged the fact. A certain refinement of
loyalty forbade him to discuss his wife, even with himself. Her
ineffectualness and the clinging quality of her love made an
irresistible appeal to the vein of chivalry which ran, like a thread
of gold, through the man's nature; and if he could not forget, he
could at least try not to remember, that her standard of uprightness
differed widely and radically from his own.

When Kresney's tactics resulted in a partial revival of her
friendliness towards him, Desmond accepted the fact with the best
grace he could muster. Since his promise to the man made definite
objection impossible, he decided that the matter must be left to the
disintegration of time; and if Kresney could have known how the
necessity chafed Desmond's pride and fastidiousness of spirit, the
knowledge would have added relish to his enjoyment of Evelyn's
society.

Thus the passing of uneventful days brought them to the middle of
February--to the end of the short, sharp Northern winter, and the
first far-off whisper of the wrath to come; brought also to Honor
Meredith a sudden perception that her year with the Desmonds was very
nearly at an end. John's latest letter announced that he hoped to get
back to the life and work he loved by the middle of April; and the
girl read that letter with such strangely mixed feelings that she was
at once puzzled and angered by her own seeming inconsistency. John had
always stood unquestionably first in her life. It would be altogether
good to have him with her again--to be able to devote herself to him
entirely as she had dreamed of doing for so many years. And yet....
There was no completing the broken sentence, which, for some
unaccountable reason, ended in a sigh.

Honor was sitting at the time in her favourite corner of the
drawing-room, on a low settee constructed out of an empty case,
cunningly hid, and massed with cushions of dull red and gold. As her
lips parted in that unjustifiable sigh she looked round at the
familiar pictures and hangings; at Desmond's well-worn chair, and the
table beside it with his pipe-rack, a photo of his father, and half a
dozen favourite books; at the graceful outline of Evelyn's figure
where she stood by the wide mantelshelf arranging roses in a silver
bowl, her head tilted to one side, a shaft of sunlight from one of the
slits of windows, fifteen feet up the wall, turning her soft fair hair
to gold.

From Evelyn's figure, Honor's glance travel