But he pressed her hand as he said it, and there was an almost tender
smile on his lips.

"But your love of truth isn't quite dead yet," he added, on the
threshold of the door, as he let her out into the rain. "You haven't
been able to kill it. It's an indomitable thing, thank God."

"I wish I--why do you live always in Liverpool?" she murmured.

She put up her little silk umbrella and was gone.

There was a fire in her sitting-room on the following-morning. The day
was windy and cold, for March was going out resentfully. Before the fire
lay Turkish Jane on a cushion, blinking placidly at the flames. Already
she had become reconciled to her new life in this unknown city. Her
ecstasy of the journey had not returned, but the surprise which had
succeeded to it was now merged in a stagnant calm, and she felt no
objection to passing the remainder of her life in the Adelphi Hotel. She
supposed that she was comfortably settled for the day when she heard her
mistress call for Annette and give the most objectionable order.

"Please take Jane away, Annette," said Lady Ingleton.

"Miladi!"

"I don't want her here this morning. I'm expecting a visitor, and Jane
might bark. I don't wish to have a noise in the room."

Annette, who looked decidedly sulky, approached the cushion, bent down,
and rather abruptly snatched the amazed doyenne of the Pekinese from her
voluptuous reveries.

"We shall probably leave here to-morrow," Lady Ingleton added.

Annette's expression changed.

"We're going back to London, Miladi?"

"I think so. I'll tell you this afternoon."

She glanced at her watch.

"I don't wish to be disturbed for an hour. Don't leave Jane in my
bedroom. Take her away to yours."

"Very well, Miladi."

Annette went out looking inquisitive, with Turkish Jane on her arm.

When she was gone Lady Ingleton took up "The Liverpool Mercury" and
tried to read the news of the day. The March wind roared outside and
made the windows rattle. She listened to it and forgot the chronicle of
the passing hour. She was a women who cared to know the big things that
were happening in the big world. She had always lived among men who were
helping to make history, and she was intelligent enough to understand
their efforts and to join in their discussions. Her husband had often
consulted her when he was in a tight place, and sometimes he had told
her she had the brain of a man. But she had the nerves and the heart of
a woman, and at