it long;
she had laid her hand softly upon his, and as he turned, he saw that
her eyes were wet and shining. 'Mark,' she said, 'it is you I love,
not that book; and now, when I know all it has cost you--oh, my dear,
my dear--did you think it would make me love you less?'

He could not answer her by words, but he drew her nearer to him till
her head rested upon his shoulder, and so they sat, silent, with hands
clasped, until they reached home.

Seldom again, and only under strong compulsion, did Mabel make any
reference to 'Illusion,' nor was it till long after that he suspected
the depth and reason of her resentment against Vincent--he was content
to feel that her love for himself was unchanged.

But though she strove, and successfully, to hide it from her husband,
this lowering of her ideal caused her a secret anguish; it had always
been difficult to reconcile Mark as his nature seemed revealed in
private life, with the Mark who had written 'Illusion.' One of her
dreams had been that, as their intimacy grew, all reserve would
vanish, and he would speak to her of his inmost thoughts and fancies,
which it seemed almost as if he thought her unable to appreciate as
yet.

Now all this was over, there were no hidden depths to fathom in his
mind, no sublime heights to which she could rise; such as she knew him
now, he was and must remain--not a strong and solitary genius with
lofty thoughts of which he feared to speak freely, not a guide on whom
she could lean unquestioning through life, only a man with a bright
but shallow nature, impulsive and easily led. Even the Quixotic honour
which had led him to entangle himself in complications at another's
bidding showed a mind incapable of clear judgment--or he would have
renounced the rash promise when it began to involve others. Sadly
enough she realised the weakness implied in this, and yet it only
infused a new element of pity and protection in the love she felt for
him, and she adapted herself bravely to the changed conditions of her
life.

After Holroyd had spoken, she had never questioned that his version
was the true one, and Caffyn's charge an infamous fabrication--whatever
she might have been driven to think in that one instant of sickening
doubt.

To a more suspicious nature, perhaps, some of the facts connected with
Vincent's visit to Laufingen might even then have presented
difficulties, but if Mabel had remembered all that had occurred there
more clearly than