Theatre when with a sickening horror he had discovered
Violet Vere to be no other than Violet Neville,--his own little violet!
. . . as he had once called her--his wife that he had lost and mourned as
though she were some pure dead woman lying sweetly at rest in a quiet
grave. He remembered Thelma's shuddering repugnance at the sight of
her,--a repugnance which he himself had shared--and which made him
shrink with fastidious aversion, from the idea of confiding to any one
but Sir Philip, the miserable secret of his connection with her. Sir
Philip had humored him in this fancy, little imagining that any mischief
would come of it--and the reward of his kindly sympathy was this,--his
name was compromised, his home desolate, and his wife estranged from
him!

In the first pangs of the remorse and sorrow that filled his heart,
Neville could gladly have gone out and drowned himself. Presently he
began to think,--was there not some one else beside himself who might
possibly be to blame for all this misery? For instance, who could have
brought or sent that letter to Lady Errington? In her high station, she,
so lofty, so pure, so far above the rest of her sex, would have been the
last person to make any inquiries about such a woman as Violet Vere. How
had it all happened? He looked imploringly for some minutes at the
dejected figure in the chair without daring to offer a word of
consolation. Presently he ventured a remark--

"Sir Philip!" he stammered. "It will soon be all right,--her ladyship
will come back immediately. I myself will explain--it's--it's only a
misunderstanding . . ."

Errington moved in his chair impatiently, but said nothing. Only a
misunderstanding! How many there are who can trace back broken
friendships and severed loves to that one thing--"only a
misunderstanding!" The tenderest relations are often the most delicate
and subtle, and "trifles light as air" may scatter and utterly destroy
the sensitive gossamer threads extending between one heart and another,
as easily as a child's passing foot destroys the spider's web woven on
the dewy grass in the early mornings of spring.

Presently Sir Philip started up--his lashes were wet and his face was
flushed.

"It's no good sitting here," he said, rapidly buttoning on his overcoat.
"I must go after her. Let all the business go to the devil! Write and
say I won't stand for Middleborough--I resign in favor of the Liberal
candidate. I'm off to Norway to-night."