Would she in eighteen months’ time—­she should certainly refuse to marry within the year—­be standing at the altar in a “confection” of lilac and white with Hugh; or would she be a miserable wife, moving ghostlike about her house, in colored raiment, while a distant grave was always white with flowers sent by a nameless friend of the dead?  “How some one must have loved him!” she imagined Hugh’s aged mother saying.  And once, as that bereaved mother came in the dusk to weep beside the grave, did she not see a shadowy figure start up, black-robed, from the flower-laden sod, and, hastily drawing a thick veil over a beautiful, despairing face, glide away among the trees?  At this point Lady Newhaven always began to cry.  It was too heart-rending.  And her mind in violent recoil was caught once more, and broken on the same wheel.  “Which? Which?”

A servant entered.

“Would her ladyship see Miss West for a few minutes?”

“Yes,” said Lady Newhaven, glad to be delivered from herself, if only by the presence of an acquaintance.

“It is very charitable of you to see me,” said Rachel.  “Personally, I think morning calls ought to be a penal offence.  But I came at the entreaty of a former servant of yours.  I feel sure you will let me carry some message of forgiveness to her, as she is dying.  Her name is Morgan.  Do you remember her?”

“I once had a maid called Morgan,” said Lady Newhaven.  “She was drunken, and I had to part with her in the end; but I kept her as long as I could in spite of it.  She had a genius for hair-dressing.”

“She took your diamond heart pendant,” continued Rachel.  “She was never found out.  She can’t return it, for, of course, she sold it and spent the money.  But now at last she feels she did wrong, and she says she will die easier for your forgiveness.”

“Oh!  I forgive her,” said Lady Newhaven, indifferently.  “I often wondered how I lost it.  I never cared about it.”  She glanced at Rachel, and added tremulously, “My husband gave it me.”

A sudden impulse was urging her to confide in this grave, gentle-eyed woman.  The temptation was all the stronger because Rachel, who had only lately appeared in society, was not connected with any portion of her previous life.  She was as much a chance acquaintance as a fellow-passenger in a railway carriage.

Rachel rose and held out her hand.

“Don’t go,” whispered Lady Newhaven, taking her outstretched hand and holding it.

“I think if I stay,” said Rachel, “that you may say things you will regret later on when you are feeling stronger.  You are evidently tired out now.  Everything looks exaggerated when we are exhausted, as I see you are.”

“I am worn out with misery,” said Lady Newhaven.  “I have not slept for a fortnight.  I feel I must tell some one.”  And she burst into violent weeping.