ughly that
he re-acted to it even in this supreme crisis of his life. He might give
expression to brutal passion, but in no circumstances whatever must he
break down and weep in public.

He turned quickly and blundered out of the room with a stumbling eagerness
to be alone that was extraordinarily pathetic.

"You'll admit, B., that it's cursedly hard lines on Ronnie after all these
years," Frank said with what sounded like genuine emotion.

She took that up at once. "I know it is," she said. "It's going to be hard
lines on lots of people, but there's no way out of it. You may think it's
silly tosh to talk about Fate; but it _is_ Fate."

And then she looked at Banks with something in her expression that was
surely enough to compensate him for any pain or sacrifice he might have to
endure for her.

"_We_ can't help it, can we, Arthur?" she said.

He was too moved to answer. He set his lips tightly together and shook his
head, gazing at her with a look of adoration and confidence that was
almost violent in its protestation of love.

Jervaise turned round and leaned his forehead against the high
mantelpiece. I looked out of the window. Anne remained hidden in the
corner of the settle. We all, no doubt, had the same feeling that this
love-affair was showing itself as something too splendid to be interfered
with. Whether or not it had the qualities that make for endurance, it had
a present force that dwarfed every other emotion. Those two lovers ruled
us by their perfect devotion to each other. I felt ashamed of my presence
there, as if I had intruded upon some fervent religious ceremony. They
were both so sincere, so gallant, and so proud.

It was Banks who re-started the conversation. The solitude we had
permitted to the lovers was at once too little and too much for them. What
had passed between them by an exchange of signals in the brief interval, I
could only guess; they certainly had not spoken, but Banks's new subject
suggested that they had somehow agreed to divert the interest momentarily
from themselves.

"I've brought Mr. Melhuish back with me," he said. "He's going to stay the
night with us." He may have been addressing Brenda in answer to some look
of inquiry that had indicated my resolutely unconscious back.

Since Turnbull had gone, I was more than ever the outsider and intruder,
and I was all too keenly aware of that fact as I turned back towards the
room. My embarrassment was not relieved by the sl