?'

Sheila slowly raised her eyes.

'It is because, my dear, you don't care the ghost of a straw for either.
That one--he was worn out long ago, and we never knew it. I know it now.
Time and the sheer going-on of day by day, without either of us guessing
at it, wore that down till it had no more meaning for you or me than any
other faded remembrance in this interminable footling with truth that we
call life. And this one--the whole abject meaning of it lies simply in
the fact that it has pierced down and shown us up. I had no courage.
I couldn't see how feeble a hold I had on life--just one's friends'
opinions. It was all at second hand. What I want to know now is--leave
me out; don't think, or care, or regard my living-on one shadow of an
iota--all I ask is, What am I to do for you?' He turned away and stood
staring down at the cinders in the fireless grate.

'I answer that mad wicked outburst with one plain question,' said a low,
trembling voice; 'did you or did you not go to Widderstone yesterday?'

'I did go.'

'You sat there, just as you said you sat before; and with all your heart
and soul strove to regain--yourself?'

Lawford lifted a still, colourless face into the sunlight. 'No,' he
said; 'I spent the evening at the house of a friend.'

'Then I say it is infamous. You cast all this on me. You have brought
me into contempt and poisoned Alice's whole life. You dream and idle
on just as you used to do, without the least care or thought or
consideration for others; and go out in this condition--go out
absolutely unashamed--to spend the evening at a friend's. Peculiar
friends they must be. Why, really, Arthur, you must be mad!'

Lawford paused. Like a flock of sheep streaming helter-skelter before
the onset of a wolf were the thoughts that a moment before had seemed so
orderly and sober.

'Not mad--possessed,' he said softly.

'And I add this,' cried Sheila, as it were out of a tragic mask,
'somewhere in the past, whether of your own life, or of the lives of
those who brought you into the world--the world which you pretend so
conveniently to despise--somewhere is hidden some miserable secret. God
visits all sins. On you has fallen at last the payment. THAT I believe.
You can't run away, any more than a child can run away from the cupboard
it has been locked into for a punishment. Who's going to hear you now?
You have deliberately refused to make a friend of me. Fight it out
alone, then!'

Lawford heard