on
her own hidden wound.

He helped her there, knowing, in his guile, that to exonerate Tante was
to help not only Karen but himself. "Of course; but she doesn't think
things out, does she? She is accustomed to having things arranged for
her. I suppose she didn't a bit realise all that had been settled over
here, nor what an impatient lover it was who held you to your word."

Her face cleared as he showed her that he recognised Tante's case as so
explicable. "I'm so glad that you see it all," she said. "For you do.
She is oh! so unpractical, poor darling; she would forget everything,
you know, unless I or Mrs. Talcott were there to keep reminding
her--except her music, of course; but that is like breathing to her. And
I am so sorry, so dreadfully sorry; because, of course, to know that she
hurt me by not coming must hurt her more. But we will make it up to her.
And oh! Gregory, only think, she says she may come and stay with us."

One of her first exclamations on going over his flat with him was that
they could put up Tante, if she would come. The drawing-room could be
devoted to her music; for there was ample room for the grand
piano--which accompanied Madame von Marwitz as invariably as her
tooth-brush; and the spare-bedroom had a dressing-room attached that
would do nicely for Louise. Now there seemed hope of this dream being
realised.

Karen had not yet received a wedding-present from her guardian, but in
Paris, on the homeward way, she heard that it had been dispatched from
New York and would be awaiting her in London, and it was of this gift
that she had been talking as she and Gregory drove from the station to
St. James's on a warm October evening. Tante had not told her what the
present was, but had written that Karen would care for it very much. "To
find her present waiting for us is like having Tante to welcome us,"
Karen said. After her surmise about the present she relapsed into happy
musings and Gregory, too, was silent, able only to give a side-glance of
gratitude, as it were, at the thought that Tante was to welcome them by
proxy.

His mood was one of almost tremulous elation. He was bringing her home
after bridal wanderings that had never lost their element of dream-like
unreality. There had always been the feeling that he might wake any day
to find Italy and Karen both equally illusory. But to see Karen in his
home, taking her place in his accustomed life, would be to feel his joy
linking itself