She had always imagined she would take up her friendship with him again, and when he died she reproached herself for having temporarily laid it aside.  Perhaps no one, except Lord Newhaven’s brothers, felt his death more than Dick and Hester and the Bishop.  The Bishop had sincerely liked Lord Newhaven.  A certain degree of friendship had existed between the two men, which had often trembled on the verge of intimacy.  But the verge had never been crossed.  It was the younger man who always drew back.  The Bishop, with the instinct of the true priest, had an unshaken belief in his cynical neighbor.  Lord Newhaven, who trusted no one, trusted the Bishop.  They might have been friends.  But there was a deeper reason for grief at his death than any sense of personal loss.  The Bishop was secretly convinced that he had died by his own hand.

Lord Newhaven had come to see him, the night he left Westhope, on his way to the station.  He had only stayed a few minutes, and had asked him to do him a trifling service.  The older man had agreed, had seen a momentary hesitation as Lord Newhaven turned to leave the room, and had forgotten the incident immediately in the press of continuous business.  But with the news of his death the remembrance of that momentary interview returned, and with it the instant conviction that that accidental death had been carefully planned.

* * * * *

And now Hester’s visit at the Palace had come to an end, and the Bishop’s carriage was taking her back to Warpington.

The ten days at Southminster had brought a little color back to her thin cheeks, a little calmness to her glance.  She had experienced the rest—­better than sleep—­of being understood, of being able to say what she thought without fear of giving offence.  The Bishop’s hospitality had been extended to her mind, instead of stopping short at the menu.

Her hands were full of chrysanthemums which the Bishop had picked for her himself; her small head full of his parting words and counsel.

Yes, she would do as he so urgently advised, give up the attempt to live at Warpington.  She had been there a whole year.  If the project had failed, as he seemed to think it had, at any rate, it had been given a fair trial.  Both sides had done their best.  She might ease money matters later for her brother by laying by part of the proceeds of this book for Regie’s schooling.  She could see that the Bishop thought highly of the book.  He had read it before it was sent to the publisher.  While she was at the Palace he had asked her to reconsider one or two passages in it which he thought might give needless offence to her brother and others of his mental calibre, and she had complied at once, and had sent for the book.  No doubt she should find it at Warpington on her return.