Alice slipped her hand beneath a cushion, drew forth her husband’s note and gave it to him.

“Read that,” she said, gazing doggedly into the fire, her chin in her hands.

“‘I may pass the summer in the woods’”—­he read. “’Make no arrangements—­’ Well, what of it?” This came with a breath of relief.  Alice raised her head wearily.

“It means that my life will be different—­a country boarding house or a camp up in those wretched woods, I suppose—­an existence”—­she went on, her voice regaining its old dominant note—­“not life!”

“And no more Newport for either of us,” he muttered half audibly to himself with a tone of regret.

Alice looked up at him, her white hands clenched.

“I won’t have it!” she exclaimed hotly; “I simply won’t have it.  I should die in a place like that.  Buried,” she went on bitterly, “among a lot of country bumpkins!  Sam’s a fool!”

“And you believe him to be in earnest?” he asked at length.  She made no reply; her flushed cheeks again sunk in her jewelled hands.  “Do you, seriously?” he demanded with sudden fear.

“Yes—­very much in earnest—­that’s the worst of it,” she returned, with set, trembling lips.

For some moments he watched her in silence, she breathing in nervous gasps, her slippered feet pressed hard in the soft rug.  A sudden desire rushed through him to take her in his arms, yet he dared not risk it.

“Come,” he said, at last, “let us reason this thing out.  We’re neither of us fools.  Besides, it does not seem possible he will dare carry out anything in life without your consent.”

“I don’t know,” she answered slowly.  “I never believed him capable of going to the woods—­but he did.  And I must say, frankly, I never believed him capable of this.”

“You and he have had a quarrel—­am I not right?”

She shrugged her shoulders in reply.

“Perhaps,” she confessed—­“but he has never understood me—­he is incapable of understanding any woman.”

“Quite true,” he replied lightly, in his best worldly voice; “quite true.  Few men, my dear child, ever understand the women they marry.  You might have been free to-day—­free, and happier, had you—­”

He sprang to his feet, bending over her—­clasping her hands clenched in her lap.  Slowly he sought her lips.

“Don’t,” she breathed—­“don’t—­I beg of you.  You must not—­you shall not!  You know we have discussed all that before.”

“Forgive me,” said he, straightening and regaining his seat.  The ice had been thinner than he supposed, and he was too much of an expert to risk breaking through.  “But why are you so cold to me?” he asked gloomily, with a sullen glance; “you, whose whole nature is the reverse?  Do you know you are gloriously beautiful—­you, whom I have always regarded as a woman of the world, seem to have suddenly developed the conscience of a schoolgirl.”