As he was about to do so he saw her wince suddenly.  She was looking straight in front of her at the little crowd in the drawing-room.  For an instant her face turned from white to gray, and she involuntarily put out her hand as if to ward off something.  Then a lovely color mounted to her cheek; she drew herself up and entered the room, while Hugh, behind her, looked fiercely at each man in succession.

It is always the unexpected that happens.  As Rachel’s half-absent eyes passed over the group in the brilliantly lighted drawing-room her heart reared, without warning, and fell back upon her.  She had only just sufficient presence of mind to prevent her hand pressing itself against her heart.  He was there; he was before her—­the man whom she had loved with passion for four years, and who had tortured her.

Mr. Harvey (the great Mr. Harvey) strode forward, and Rachel found her hand engulfed in a large soft hand, which seemed to have a poached egg in the palm.

“This is a pleasure to which I have long looked forward,” murmured the great man, all cuff and solitaire, bending in what he would have termed a “chivalrous manner” over Rachel’s hand; while Doll, standing near, wondered drearily “why these writing chaps were always such bounders.”

Rachel passed on to greet Miss Barker, standing on the hearthrug, this time in magenta velveteen, but presumably still tired of the Bible, conversing with Rachel’s former lover, whose eyes were on the floor and whose hand gripped the mantel-piece.  He had seen her—­recognized her.

“May I introduce Mr. Tristram?” said Sybell to Rachel.

“We have met before,” said Rachel, gently, as he bowed without looking at her, and she put out her hand.

He was obliged to touch it, obliged to meet for one moment the clear, calm eyes that had once held boundless love for him, boundless trust in him; that had, as he well knew, wept themselves half blind for him.

Mr. Tristram was one of the many who judge their actions in the light of after-circumstances, and who towards middle-age discover that the world is a treacherous world.  He had not been “in a position to marry” when he had fallen in love with Rachel.  But he had been as much in love with her as was consistent with a permanent prudential passion for himself and his future—­that future which the true artist must ever preserve untrammelled.  “High hopes faint on a warm hearthstone,” etc.  He had felt keenly breaking with Rachel.  Later on, when a tide of wealth flowed up to the fifth floor of Museum Buildings, he had recognized, for the first time, that he had made a great mistake in life.  To the smart of baffled love had been added acute remorse, not so much for wealth missed as for having inflicted upon himself and upon her a frightful and unnecessary pain.  But how could he have foreseen such a thing?  How could he tell? he had asked himself, in mute stupefaction, when the news reached him.  What a cheat life was!  What a fickle jade was Fortune!