oon left alone, and continued her walk, waiting for
her mother's return. As she went round and round the gravel paths,
she thought of the words that she had said to her mother. She had
declared that she also was widowed. "And so it should be," she said,
debating the matter with herself. "What can a heart be worth if
it can be transferred hither and thither as circumstances and
convenience and comfort may require? When he held me here in his
arms"--and, as the thoughts ran through her brain, she remembered the
very spot on which they had stood--"oh, my love!" she had said to him
then as she returned his kisses--"oh, my love, my love, my love!"
"When he held me here in his arms, I told myself that it was right,
because he was my husband. He has changed, but I have not. It might
be that I should have ceased to love him, and then I should have told
him so. I should have done as he did." But, as she came to this, she
shuddered, thinking of the Lady Alexandrina. "It was very quick," she
said, still speaking to herself; "very, very. But then men are not
the same as women." And she walked on eagerly, hardly remembering
where she was, thinking over it all, as she did daily; remembering
every little thought and word of those few eventful months in which
she had learned to regard Crosbie as her husband and master. She
had declared that she had conquered her unhappiness; but there were
moments in which she was almost wild with misery. "Tell me to forget
him!" she said. "It is the one thing which will never be forgotten."

At last she heard her mother's step coming down across the squire's
garden, and she took up her post at the bridge.

"Stand and deliver," she said, as her mother put her foot upon the
plank. "That is, if you've got anything worth delivering. Is anything
settled?"

"Come up to the house," said Mrs Dale, "and I'll tell you all."

CHAPTER LVIII

The Fate of the Small House

There was something in the tone of Mrs Dale's voice, as she desired
her daughter to come up to the house, and declared that her budget of
news should be opened there, which at once silenced Lily's assumed
pleasantry. Her mother had been away fully two hours, during which
Lily had still continued her walk round the garden, till at last she
had become impatient for her mother's footstep. Something serious
must have been said between her uncle and her mother during those
long two hours. The interviews to which Mrs Dale was occasionally