m, while Hugh, behind
her, looked fiercely at each man in succession.

It is always the unexpected that happens. As Rachel's half-absent eyes
passed over the group in the brilliantly lighted drawing-room her heart
reared, without warning, and fell back upon her. She had only just
sufficient presence of mind to prevent her hand pressing itself against
her heart. He was there; he was before her--the man whom she had loved
with passion for four years, and who had tortured her.

Mr. Harvey (the great Mr. Harvey) strode forward, and Rachel found her
hand engulfed in a large soft hand, which seemed to have a poached egg
in the palm.

"This is a pleasure to which I have long looked forward," murmured the
great man, all cuff and solitaire, bending in what he would have termed
a "chivalrous manner" over Rachel's hand; while Doll, standing near,
wondered drearily "why these writing chaps were always such bounders."

Rachel passed on to greet Miss Barker, standing on the hearthrug, this
time in magenta velveteen, but presumably still tired of the Bible,
conversing with Rachel's former lover, whose eyes were on the floor and
whose hand gripped the mantel-piece. He had seen her--recognized her.

"May I introduce Mr. Tristram?" said Sybell to Rachel.

"We have met before," said Rachel, gently, as he bowed without looking
at her, and she put out her hand.

He was obliged to touch it, obliged to meet for one moment the clear,
calm eyes that had once held boundless love for him, boundless trust in
him; that had, as he well knew, wept themselves half blind for him.

Mr. Tristram was one of the many who judge their actions in the light of
after-circumstances, and who towards middle-age discover that the world
is a treacherous world. He had not been "in a position to marry" when he
had fallen in love with Rachel. But he had been as much in love with her
as was consistent with a permanent prudential passion for himself and
his future--that future which the true artist must ever preserve
untrammelled. "High hopes faint on a warm hearthstone," etc. He had felt
keenly breaking with Rachel. Later on, when a tide of wealth flowed up
to the fifth floor of Museum Buildings, he had recognized, for the first
time, that he had made a great mistake in life. To the smart of baffled
love had been added acute remorse, not so much for wealth missed as for
having inflicted upon himself and upon her a frightful and unnecessary
pain. But how could he