irs, which were the chief
furniture of the sitting-room, were the most comfortable she had ever
taken her ease in.

At seven o'clock the padre and Sir Charles Ross, Grey's wounded friend,
arrived. After they had talked for a few minutes, making Olivia's
acquaintance, the padre married them. Henderson, Grey's valet, a tall,
spare Scot with rugged features who in the course of his seven years'
service had acquired, in his manner and way of speaking, a curious and
striking likeness to his master, was the second witness.

It was wholly characteristic of Olivia that she felt no slightest need of
the supporting presence of a woman. Yet, for all the unfamiliar
simplicity of the scene, the ceremony did not lack dignity, or
impressiveness. At the end of it Olivia felt herself very much more the
wife of Antony Grey than she had ever felt herself the wife of Lord
Loudwater.

They dined in a private dining-room at the "Ritz," and Olivia found the
dinner delightful. The three men, after some desultory talk about common
friends and the ordinary London subjects, fell to talking about their
work and their fighting in France. She was most pleased by the evident
respect and admiration with which the other two regarded her husband. It
was a new experience for her to be married to a man for whom any one
showed respect.

At a few minutes past ten she and Grey went home to his flat. They
preferred to walk.

Olivia did not return to Loudwater for three days. Grey did not return
till the day after that. Then they again spent much of their time in the
pavilion in the East wood, and since Olivia was careful not to replace
William Roper, no one knew of their meetings. Every week they went to
London for two days. They lived in an absorption in one another which
left them little time to be troubled by fears of the danger which hung
over them. The scandal about them ran the usual nine days' course. Then,
since no new development of the Loudwater case arose to give it a fresh,
active life, it died down.

About a fortnight after their marriage Mr. Manley retired from his post
of secretary and went to London. A few days later he married Helena
Truslove at the office of a registrar, and they established themselves in
a furnished flat at Clarence Gate, while they furnished a flat of their
own. Mr. Manley found himself, under the influence of domesticity, the
stimulation of life in London, and the society of the intelligent,
writing his new play w