nd a book, to wander away across the lawn to
the gate in the ring fence, and then along the path at the edge of the
beech wood, ostensibly to find a seat in the shade of one of the great
spreading trees, and have a calm, quiet read.

But ere she had gone a couple of hundred yards the fever in her blood
and the throbbing of her temples told her that the idea of calm and rest
was the merest farce.

She had hailed the departure of the gentlemen for Paris, as they had
said, as a relief from the quiet, insidious siege laid to her by James
Clareborough, who rarely spoke but on the most commonplace topics, and
was always coldly polite; but there were moments when she met his eyes
and read plainly enough that his intentions were unaltered, and that
sooner of later he would again begin to make protestations of his love.

Her position seemed harder than she could bear. His wife hated her with
a bitter, jealous hatred, but she was too much crushed down and afraid
of her fierce lord to show her dislike more openly, though there were
times when she seemed ready to break out into open reproach.

"Oh, if I could only end it all!" thought Marion again and again. "Will
Rob never break with them?

"Never," she said to herself, despairingly; "they would never let him
go. And yet surely the world is wide enough, and somewhere surely he
might find peace.

"No, he would never settle down to another life. It is fate. There is
neither peace nor happiness now for me."

She had wandered on for quite a mile before, feeling hot and wearied,
she seated herself on one of the great gnarled mossy buttresses of a
beech and leaned her head upon her hand, thinking of him whom she could
not keep out of her thoughts, but still only in despair. Then her
thoughts turned once more to James Clareborough, and, brave and firm as
she was, a thrill of horror ran through her at the dread which oppressed
her and set her heart throbbing wildly.

What if this Parisian journey was only a ruse and James Clareborough
were back on purpose to try and gain a meeting with her while her
brother was not by her side?

The thought was horrible, and it grew more intense, her cheeks flushing
and then growing ghastly white from her emotion.

"What madness to come out here alone!" she thought. "He would have been
watching for me, and be ready to read it as an invitation."

She looked round wildly, and started as a sharp tap was heard close at
hand.

"Am I growi