ad come
to the point of almost welcoming a break in the impossible deadlock at
which his domestic life had arrived. His beloved one's nerves had broken
down from one cause and another, and she was drifting into the habits of
a confirmed invalid. If he did not let her go, he would, perhaps, have
to stand aside and watch her increasing intimacy with the doctor whom he
could not challenge without creating a disgusting scandal; which would
make life in Bengal intolerable for himself as well as for her. So he
agreed to her departure with the child in the hope that "absence would
make her heart grow fonder," and that she would come back to him,
restored, when the cold season returned and made life in India not only
tolerable, but pleasant.

Hurried arrangements were put through, a passage secured, and Joyce
roused herself to bid her friends a formal farewell.

At the Brights', only Honor was at home, her mother having driven to the
bazaar for muslin to make new curtains. Christmas was approaching and a
general "spring cleaning" was in full swing in order that everything
should look fresh for the season.

"It is the greatest day in the year, and even the natives expect us to
honour it. Our festival, you know," Honor explained.

"It always looks so odd to have to celebrate Christmas with a warm sun
shining and all the trees in full leaf!" said Joyce. "That is why it
never feels Christmas to me. I miss the home aspect,--frost and snow,
and landscapes bleak and bare."

"The advantage lies with us. We can calculate on the weather with
confidence, and it is so much more comfortable to feel warm. And then
everything looks so bright!"

"I am glad you like it since you have to stay. I hate India more than
ever."

Honor looked earnestly at her, and wonderingly. "Isn't it rather a
wrench to you to leave your husband?" Joyce had grown so apathetic and
cold.

For answer her friend broke down completely, and wept as though her
heart would break. "We seem to be drifting apart. Oh, Honey, I love him
so!"

"Then why go?"

"I must. I want to think things over and recover by myself. I am trying
to forget all about that night in the ruins, and hoping for time to put
things to rights. Perhaps I shall return quite soon. Perhaps, if the
doctor is transferred, I shall find courage to write and tell Ray all
about _it_. I am all nerves, sometimes I believe I am ill, for I can't
sleep well and have all sorts of horrid dreams about cholera