Elizabeth, apparently, took it calmly.  She was standing with one hand on the table behind her, and the autumn sun streaming in through the western windows caught the little golden curls on her temples, and the one or two small adornments that she habitually wore, especially a Greek coin—­a gold stater—­hanging on a slender chain round her neck.  In the Squire’s eyes, the stately figure in plain black, with the brilliant head and hands, had in some way gathered into itself the significance of the library.  All the background of books, with its pale and yet rich harmony of tone, the glass cases with their bronzes and terra-cottas, the statues, the papers on the table, the few flowers that were never wanting to Elizabeth’s corner, the taste with which the furniture had been re-arranged, the general elegance and refinement of the big room in fact, since Elizabeth had reduced it from chaos to order, were now related to her rather than to him.  He could not now think of the room without her.  She had become in this short time so markedly its presiding spirit.  ‘Let there be order and beauty!’ she had said, instead of dirt and confusion; and the order and beauty were there.

But the presiding spirit was now surveying him, with eyes that seemed to have been watchfully withdrawn, under puckered brows.

‘I don’t understand,’ said Elizabeth.  ’You have fastened up the gates?’

‘I have,’ said the Squire jocularly.  ’Mrs. Perley believes the Committee will bring a tank!  That would be a sight worth seeing.’

‘You really want to stop them from ploughing up that land?’

‘I do.  I have offered them other land.’

Elizabeth hesitated.

‘Don’t you believe what the Government say, Mr. Mannering?’

‘What do they say?’

’That everything depends upon whether we shall have food enough to hold out?  That we can’t win the war unless we can grow more food ourselves?’

‘That’s the Government’s affair.’  The Squire sat down at his own table and began to look out a pen.

’Well now, Miss Bremerton, I don’t think we need spend any more time over this tiresome business.  I’ve already lost the morning.  Suppose we get on with the work we were doing yesterday?’

He turned an amicable countenance towards her.  She on her side moved a little towards a window near her table, and looked out of it, as though reflecting.  After a minute or two he asked himself with a vague anxiety what was wrong with her.  Her manner was certainly unusual.

Suddenly she turned, and came half across the room towards him.

‘May I speak to you, please, Mr. Mannering?’

‘By all means.  Is there anything amiss?’

’I think we agreed on a month’s notice, on either side.  I should be glad if you would kindly accept my notice as from to-day.’

The Squire rose violently, and thrust back his chair.

‘So that’s what you have been cogitating in my absence?’