so neither he nor Zara would come to luncheon;
and she was to trust him and not speak of this to any one until he
himself told her more. He might come and see her in Cannes, the
following week.

Then he wrote to Zara, and these were his words:

"I know everything. I understand now, and however I blame you for your
deception of me you have my deep sympathy in your grief. I am going away
for a week, so you will not be distressed by seeing me. Then I must ask
you to meet me, here or at your uncle's house, to arrange for our future
separation.

"Yours,

"Tancred."

Then he rang for a messenger boy, and gave him both notes, and, picking
up the telephone, called up his valet and told him to pack and bring his
things here to his old rooms, and, if her ladyship came in, to see that
she immediately got the note he was sending round to her. Francis
Markrute would have gone to the City by now and was going to lunch with
Ethelrida, so he telephoned to one of his clerks there--finding he was
out for the moment--just to say he was called away for a week and would
write later.

She should have the first words with her uncle. Whether she would tell
him or no she must decide, he would not do anything to make her
existence more difficult than it must naturally be.

And then when all this was done the passionate jealousy of a man
overcame him again, and when he thought of Mimo he once more longed to
kill.

CHAPTER XL

It was late in the afternoon when Zara got back to her uncle's house.
She had been too distracted with grief to know or care about time, or
what they would be thinking of her absence.

Just after the poor little one was dead frantic telegrams had come from
the Morleys, in consternation at his disappearance, and Mimo, quite
prostrate in his sorrow, as he had been at her mother's death, had left
all practical things to Zara.

No doctor turned up, either. Mimo had not coherently given the address,
on the telephone. Thus they passed the day alone with their dead, in
anguish; and at last thought came back to Zara. She would go to her
uncle, and let him help to settle things; she could count upon him to do
that.

Francis Markrute, anxious and disturbed by Tristram's message and her
absence, met her as she came in and drew her into the library.

The butler had handed her her husband's note, but she held it listlessly
in her hand, without opening it. She was still too numb with sorrow to
take notice of ordi