The fatigue and anxiety she had undergone during the last two days had wrought great changes in her face.  A girl of eighteen or twenty years may gain delicacy and even beauty from the physical effects of grief, but a woman over thirty years old gains neither.  Mrs. Goddard’s complexion, naturally pale, had taken a livid hue; her lips, which were never very red, were almost white; heavy purple shadows darkened her eyes; the two or three lines that were hardly noticeable, but which were the natural result of a sad expression in her face, had in two days become distinctly visible and had almost assumed the proportions of veritable wrinkles.  Her features were drawn and pinched—­she looked ten years older than she was.  Nothing remained of her beauty but her soft waving brown hair and her deep, pathetic, violet eyes.  Even her small hands seemed to have grown thin and looked unnaturally white and transparent.

She was sitting in her favourite chair by the fire, when the vicar arrived.  She had not been willing to seem ill, in spite of what Martha had said, and she had refused to put cushions in the chair.  She was making an effort, and even a little sense of physical discomfort helped to make the effort seem easier.  She was so much exhausted that she felt she must not for one moment relax the tension she imposed upon herself lest her whole remaining strength should suddenly collapse and leave her at the mercy of events.  But Mr. Ambrose was startled when he saw her and feared that she was very ill.

“My dear Mrs. Goddard,” he said, “what is the matter?  Are you ill?  Has anything happened?”

As he spoke he changed the form of his question, suddenly recollecting that Mr. Juxon had probably on the previous afternoon told her of her husband’s escape, as he had meant to do.  This might be the cause of her indisposition.

“Yes,” she said in a voice that did not sound like her own, “I have asked you to come because I am in great trouble—­in desperate trouble.”

“Dear me,” said the vicar, “I hope not!”

“Not desperate?  Perhaps not.  Dear Mr. Ambrose, you have always been so kind to me—­I am sure you can help me now.”  Her voice trembled.

“Indeed I will do my best,” said the vicar who judged from so unusual an outburst that there must be really something wrong.  “If you could tell me what it is—­” he suggested.

“That is the hardest part of it,” said the unhappy woman.  She paused a moment as though to collect her strength.  “You know,” she began again, “that my husband has escaped?”

“A terrible business!” exclaimed the good man, nodding, however, in affirmation to the question she asked.

“I have seen him,” said Mary Goddard very faintly, looking down at her thin hands.  The vicar started in astonishment.

“My dear friend—­dear me!  Dear, dear, how very painful!”

“Indeed, you do not know what I have suffered.  It is most dreadful, Mr. Ambrose.  You cannot imagine what a struggle it was.  I am quite worn out.”