Toward the close of the December afternoon, Magdalen sat alone in the lodging which she had occupied since her arrival in London.  The fire burned sluggishly in the narrow little grate; the view of the wet houses and soaking gardens opposite was darkening fast; and the bell of the suburban muffin-boy tinkled in the distance drearily.  Sitting close over the fire, with a little money lying loose in her lap, Magdalen absently shifted the coins to and fro on the smooth surface of her dress, incessantly altering their positions toward each other, as if they were pieces of a “child’s puzzle” which she was trying to put together.  The dim fire-light flaming up on her faintly from time to time showed changes which would have told their own tale sadly to friends of former days.  Her dress had become loose through the wasting of her figure; but she had not cared to alter it.  The old restlessness in her movements, the old mobility in her expression, appeared no more.  Her face passively maintained its haggard composure, its changeless unnatural calm.  Mr. Pendril might have softened his hard sentence on her, if he had seen her now; and Mrs. Lecount, in the plenitude of her triumph, might have pitied her fallen enemy at last.

Hardly four months had passed since the wedding-day at Aldborough, and the penalty for that day was paid already—­paid in unavailing remorse, in hopeless isolation, in irremediable defeat!  Let this be said for her; let the truth which has been told of the fault be told of the expiation as well.  Let it be recorded of her that she enjoyed no secret triumph on the day of her success.  The horror of herself with which her own act had inspired her, had risen to its climax when the design of her marriage was achieved.  She had never suffered in secret as she suffered when the Combe-Raven money was left to her in her husband’s will.  She had never felt the means taken to accomplish her end so unutterably degrading to herself, as she felt them on the day when the end was reached.  Out of that feeling had grown the remorse which had hurried her to seek pardon and consolation in her sister’s love.  Never since it had first entered her heart, never since she had first felt it sacred to her at her father’s grave, had the Purpose to which she had vowed herself, so nearly lost its hold on her as at this time.  Never might Norah’s influence have achieved such good as on the day when that influence was lost—­the day when the fatal words were overheard at Miss Garth’s—­the day when the fatal letter from Scotland told of Mrs. Lecount’s revenge.

The harm was done; the chance was gone.  Time and Hope alike had both passed her by.