back by Mrs. Grebby when Eleanor is there?

For the moment he is unnerved. Then he pulls himself together, places
the letters in his pocket, picks up his stick, and turns to go.

"Are you coming home to-day, sir?" asks Sarah.

"Coming home!" The words grate on him.

"No," he replies, "I am going to Mrs. Roche, at Copthorne."

Then he dashes out of the house, and reaches Trebovir Road just as
Erminie and Nelson are at breakfast.

"We could not think what had become of you," cries Mrs. Lane, running
out to meet him. "Why did you go out, and where have you been?"

Then she sees how pale he is, and the questions die on her lips.

"Come in," she says gently. "I have got some hot coffee for you, and
your favourite dish. What! you won't eat anything?"

"No thank you, dear, I haven't time. I only fled back to tell you I am
off to Copthorne. I am a little anxious about Eleanor not having
written you know. She was rather seedy and done up before she left,
and those old people are bad correspondents."

"You think she is ill?"

"I fear something is wrong."

"But you must have something before you go, or you will be quite faint."

Philip is not in the mood to argue; he answers her abruptly, almost
rudely, and guessing that something is wrong, she lets him go, watching
him drive away with sorrowful compassionate eyes.

"I am afraid poor Phil is in some trouble again," she says to Nelson,
mechanically cracking the shell of her boiled egg. "He has gone."

"What?"

"Yes," shaking her head solemnly, "and without any breakfast."

"But you should not let him."

"I could not help it. He is going to see Eleanor."

"Has she been leading the poor fellow another dance? What a curse that
woman is!"

"Don't talk like that! I am very fond of Eleanor, with all her
faults--almost as fond as of Phil, and you know how I love him. I am
not sure what it is about her, but you can't bring yourself not to care
for her. It's that pretty little confiding way, I think, and those
lovely wistful eyes. She is so easily led and swayed. It is a great
pity."

"She will come to a bad end, depend upon it," replies Nelson,
congratulating himself on the good woman who crowns his home.

Philip takes the morning train to Copthorne. Business goes to the
wind. He thinks only of his wife, and the letters that have come back
so strangely into his keeping.

The journey seems interminable. He flings a pile of papers unread on
the