set free." He stared out of the
window with unseeing eyes. "And then will come the question--what are we
to do?"

"To do?" She did not understand.

"Yes. You know, she will never forgive me. In her childish, unreasonable
way, she persists in thinking everything that happened was my fault. If
I had given her more money, she would not have got into debt. If I
hadn't gone to Wales and left her alone she would never have done the
thing; and if I had only lied better, the blame would have been
mine--and the punishment."

"But it was she who was guilty----"

"I know--but if I could have gone to prison in her stead, God knows I'd
have gone--willingly. Things are so different for men. When I think of
her, the little, soft, fragile thing I married, shut up alone in a cell,
wearing prison garments, eating rough prison food, being ordered about
by harsh, domineering women, why, I almost curse myself that I am free
to walk about under God's blue sky!"

"Shall you go back to London--when she is free?"

"I don't know--I don't know," he said rather drearily. "I let the house
at once--gave it up at the next quarter, and our things are stored. I
wanted to get away from it all, so I came down here and took the
bungalow, but of course it won't suit Eva."

"Couldn't you--change your name?"

"That's done already," he said. "Just after the trial an uncle
obligingly died and left me nine thousand pounds on the understanding I
should take his name; so I did, of course, and turned myself from James
Vyse into James Herrick."

"Then no one will know?"

"No. But this life, this vagabond river life that both you and I love,
wouldn't suit Eva very long. No, I'm afraid we shall have to seek some
'city of bricks and mortar'--but even my wife won't be keen on London,
and it's the only city one can live in properly."

While he talked, the rain had ceased; and he rose as he spoke the last
words.

"Well, Mrs. Rose, I've showed you the skeleton in my cupboard--and he's
a pretty grisly object, isn't he? But I don't want to depress you with a
recital of my woes. After all, life's sweet, sister--and you and I,
thanks be to God, have the soul of the gipsy within us, which is made
quite happy, poor feckless thing, by the sight of the sun or the music
of the breeze!"

Her eyes kindled with sudden comprehension.

"Yes--and you've shown me what a fool I am to think myself unhappy!" She
too sprang up, and her body was full of vigour and youth aga