Barrington broke down.  He covered his face with his hands.  Great sobs shook him.  Wingrave waited for a few minutes, and then rose to his feet.

“Barrington,” he said, “there is one thing more!  What the world may say or think counts for very little.  Society reverses its own judgments and eats its own words every day.  A little success will bring it to your feet like a whipped dog.  It is for yourself I say this, for yourself alone.  There is no reason why you should hesitate to accept any service I may be able to render you.  You understand me?”

Barrington’s face was like the face of a young man.  All the cloud of suspicion and doubts and fears was suddenly lifted.  He looked through new eyes on to a new world.

“Thank God!” he exclaimed.  “Not that I ever doubted it, Wingrave, but—­thank God!” . . .

Barrington left the house radiant,—­Lady Ruth and Wingrave were alone.  She watched him close the door and turn towards her, with a new timidity.  The color came and went in her pale cheeks, her eyes were no longer tired.  When he turned towards her, she leaned to him with a little seductive movement of her body.  Her hands stole out towards him.

“Wingrave!” she murmured.

His first action seemed to crush all the desperate joy which was rising fast in her heart.  He took one hand, and he led her to a chair.

“Ruth,” he said, “I have been talking to your husband.  There are only a few words I want to say to you.”

“There are only three I want to hear from you,” she murmured, and her eyes were pleading with him passionately all the time.  “It seems to me that I have been waiting to hear them all my life.  Wingrave, I am so tired—­and I am losing—­I want to leave it all!”

“Exactly,” he answered cheerfully, “what you are going to do.  You are going to America with your husband.”

“What do you mean?” she asked sharply.

He shrugged his shoulders.

“I am rather tired of the game,” he said, “that is all.  I am like the child who likes to build up again the house of bricks which he has thrown down.  I have procured for your husband a seat on the Alaskan Board.  It is a very distinguished position, and you will find that it will entail considerable social obligations in America.  When you return, he will be able to claim a judgeship, or a place in the Government.  You will find things go smoothly enough then.”

“But you!” she cried; “I want you!”

He looked at her gravely.

“Dear Lady Ruth,” he said, “you may think so at this moment, but you are very much mistaken.  What you really desire is a complete reconciliation with your husband and a place in the great world which no one shall be able to question.  These things are arranged for you; also—­these.”

He handed her a little packet.  She dropped it idly into her lap.  She was looking steadfastly away from them.

“You are free from me now,” he continued.  “You will find life run quite smoothly, and I do not think that you will be troubled with me when you come back from America.  I have other plans.”