f your valuable
time," said Margaret sweetly. "Must you go?"

"I really must. And--" as he held out his hand--"we are friends, then,
from henceforth?"

"Oh, of course we are," she answered. But her eyes were strangely cold,
and the smile upon her lips was conventional and frosty. The hand that
he held in his own was cold, too, and somewhat limp and flabby.

"I am so glad," he said, growing warmer as she grew cold, "that you have
resolved to renew your acquaintance with Miss Colwyn. It is what I
should have expected from your generous nature, and it shows that what I
always--always thought of you was true."

"Please do not say so," said Margaret. She came very near being natural
in that moment. She had a choking sensation in her throat, and her eyes
smarted with unshed tears. But her training stood her in good stead. "It
is very kind of you to be so complimentary," she went on with a light
little laugh. "And I hope that I shall find Janetta as nice as she used
to be. Good-bye. _Bon voyage._"

"I wish you every happiness," he said with a warm clasp of her hand and
a long grave look into her beautiful face; and then he went away and
Margaret was left alone.

She stole up to her room almost stealthily, and locked the door. She
hoped that no one had seen Sir Philip come and go--that her mother would
not question her, or remark on the length of his visit. She was
thoroughly frightened and ashamed to think of what she had done. She had
been as near as possible to making Sir Philip what would virtually have
been an offer of marriage. What an awful thought! And what a narrow
escape! For of course he would have had to refuse her, and she--what
could she have done then? She would never have borne the mortification.
As it was, she hoped that Sir Philip would accept the explanation of the
little note of summons which she had despatched to him that morning,
and would never inquire what her secret motive had been in writing it.

She set herself to consider the situation. She did not love Sir Philip.
She was not capable of a great deal of love, and all that she had been
capable of she had given to Wyvis Brand. But the years of girlhood in
her father's house were beginning to pall upon her. She was conscious of
a slight waning of her beauty, of a perceptible diminution in the
attentions which she received, and the admiration that she excited. It
had occurred to her lately, as it had occurred to her parents, that she
ought to thi