ask himself why he should be so anxious not to have offended these two new friends.  He was not ordinarily very sensitive to the opinions that might be formed of him—­more especially by persons living out of his own sphere, with whom he was not likely to associate.  He did not, indeed, as a general rule, suffer himself to be perturbed about anything; and yet, as he went along the busy thoroughfare at this moment, he was conscious that rarely in his life had he been so ill at ease.

Something now occurred that startled him out of his reverie.  Communing with himself, he was staring blankly ahead, taking little note of the people whom he saw.  But somehow, in a vague and dreamlike way, he seemed to become aware that there was some one in front of him—­a long way ahead as yet—­whom he knew.  He was still thinking of Mrs. Lorraine, and unconsciously postponing the examination of this approaching figure, or rather pair of figures, when, with a sudden start, he found Sheila’s sad and earnest eyes fixed upon him.  He woke up as from a dream.  He saw that young Mosenberg was with her, and naturally the boy would have approached Ingram, and stopped and spoken.  But Ingram paid no attention to him.  He was, with a quick pang at his heart, regarding Sheila, with the knowledge that on her rested the cruel decision as to whether she should come forward to him or not.  He was not aware that her husband had forbidden her to have any communication with him; yet he had guessed as much, partly from his knowledge of Lavender’s impatient disposition, and partly from the glance he caught of her eyes when he woke up from his trance.

Young Mosenberg turned with surprise to his companion.  She was passing on:  he did not even see that she had bowed to Ingram, with a face flushed with shame and pain and with eyes cast down.  Ingram, too, was passing on, without even shaking hands with her or uttering a word.  Mosenberg was too bewildered to attempt any protest:  he merely followed Sheila, with a conviction that something desperate had occurred, and that he would best consult her feelings by making no reference to it.

But that one look that the girl had directed to her old friend before she bowed and passed on had filled him with dismay and despair.  It was somehow like the piteous look of a wounded animal, incapable of expressing its pain.  All thoughts and fancies of his own little vexations or embarrassments were instantly banished from him:  he could only see before him those sad and piteous eyes, full of kindness to him, he thought, and of grief that she should be debarred from speaking to him, and of resignation to her own lot.

Gwdyr House did not get much work out of him that day.  He sat in a small room in a back part of the building, looking out on a lonely little square, silent and ruddy with the reflected light of the sunset.

“A hundred Mrs. Kavanaghs,” he was thinking to himself bitterly enough, “will not save my poor Sheila.  She will die of a broken heart.  I can see it in her face.  And it is I who have done it—­from first to last it is I who have done it; and now I can do nothing to help her.”