“She neither saw nor heard my madness.  No, mother, Lenore’s heart has been going from me for months past, and she is glad of this plea for release, believing me unworthy.  Oh! that stern face of hers! set like a head of Justice with not a shade of pity—­so beautiful—­ so terrible!  It will never cease to haunt me.”

He sat in deep despondency, while Mrs. Poynsett overlooked her resources; but presently he started up, saying, “There’s one shadow of a hope.  I’ll go over to Sirenwood, insist on seeing one her and having an explanation.  I have a right, whatever I did yesterday; and you have forgiven me for that, mother!”

“I think it is the most hopeful way.  If you can see her without interposition, you will at least come to an understanding.  Here, you had better take this cheque for Sir Harry.”

When he was gone, she wondered whether she had been justified in encouraging him in defending Eleonora.  Was this not too like another form of the treatment Raymond had experienced?  Her heart bled for her boy, and she was ready to cry aloud, “Must that woman always be the destroyer of my sons’ peace?”

When Frank returned, it was with a face that appalled her by its blank despair, as he again flung himself down beside her.

“She is gone,” he said.

“Gone!”

“Gone, and with the Strangeways.  I saw her.”

“Spoke to her?”

“Oh no.  The carriage turned the corner as I crossed the road.  The two girls were there, and she—­”

“Going with them to the station?”

“I thought so; I went to the house, meaning to leave my enclosure for Sir Harry and meet her on her way back; but I heard she was gone to stay with Lady Susan in Yorkshire.  Sir Harry was not up, nor Lady Tyrrell.”

Mrs. Poynsett’s hope failed, though she was relieved that Camilla’s tongue had not been in action.  She was dismayed at the prone exhausted manner in which Frank lay, partly on the floor, partly against her couch, with his face hidden.

“Do you know where she is gone?”

“Yes, Revelrig, Cleveland, Yorkshire.”

“I will write to her.  Whatever may be her intentions, they shall not be carried out under any misrepresentation that I can contradict.  You have been a foolish fellow, Frankie; but you shall not be painted worse than you are.  She owes you an explanation, and I will do my best that you shall have it.  My dear, what is the matter?”

She rang her bell hastily, and upheld the sinking head till help came.  He had not lost consciousness, and called it giddiness, and he was convicted of having never gone to bed last night, and having eaten nothing that morning; but he turned against the wine and soup with which they tried to dose him, and, looking crushed and bewildered, said he would go and lie down in his own room.

Raymond went up with him, and returned, saying he only wanted to be alone, with his face from the light; and Mrs. Poynsett, gazing at her eldest son, thought he looked as ill and sunken as his younger brother.