yet what was he to think
now? He began for the first time to distrust his own penetration; he
very much feared that his elaborate scheme of revenge was a failure,
that he must choose some other means of humbling Mabel, and must begin
all over again, which was a distressing thought to a young man in his
situation. He was glad now that he had never talked of his suspicions,
and had done nothing openly compromising. He would not give up even
yet, until he had seen Holroyd, and been able to pump him judiciously;
until then he must bear the dismal suspicion that he had overreached
himself.

One of his shafts at least had not fallen altogether wide, for as Mark
and Mabel were being driven home across the Park, she said suddenly:
'So _Harold_ knew that Vincent was alive, then?'

'Yes,' said Mark, '_he_ knew,' and he looked out of the window at the
sunset as he spoke.

'And you and Harold kept him from hearing of our wedding?' she said.
'Mark, I thought you said that you had told him?'

'Oh, no,' said Mark; 'you misunderstood--there--there were reasons.'

'Tell me them,' said Mabel.

'Well,' said Mark, 'Vincent was ill--anyone could see that what he
wanted was rest, and that the fatigue and--and--the excitement of a
wedding would be too much for him--Caffyn wanted a companion up at
Wastwater, and begged me to say nothing about our marriage just then,
and leave it to him to tell him quietly later on--that's all,
darling.'

'I don't like it, dear,' said Mabel; 'I don't like your joining Harold
in a thing like that. I know you did it all for the best, but I don't
see why you could not have told him; if he was not well enough to come
to the wedding we should have understood it!'

'Perhaps you're right,' said Mark, easily, 'but, at all events, no
harm has come of it to anybody. How they are thinning the trees along
here, aren't they? Just look down that avenue!'

And Mabel let him turn the conversation from a subject she was glad
enough to forget.

CHAPTER XXXVI.

LITTLE RIFTS.

One bright morning in May, not long after the return from the
Continent, Mabel was sitting in her own room at the back of the small
house which had been taken on Campden Hill; she was writing at a table
by the raised window, when the door opened suddenly, and Mark burst
in, in a state of suppressed but very evident excitement. 'I have
brought you something!' he said, and threw down three peacock-blue
volumes upon her open blotting-ca