“Will you say that I gratefully thank him for the letter which Lady Holchester was so good us to give me last night,” she replied.  “And will you entreat him, from me, not to expose himself, on my account, to—­” she hesitated, and finished the sentence with her eyes on the ground—­“to what might happen, if he came here and insisted on seeing me.”

“Does he propose to do that?”

She hesitated again.  The little nervous contraction of her lips at one side of the mouth became more marked than usual.  “He writes that his anxiety is unendurable, and that he is resolved to see me,” she answered softly.

“He is likely to hold to his resolution, I think,” said Julius.  “When I saw him yesterday, Sir Patrick spoke of you in terms of admiration—­”

He stopped.  The bright tears were glittering on Anne’s eyelashes; one of her hands was toying nervously with something hidden (possibly Sir Patrick’s letter) in the bosom of her dress.  “I thank him with my whole heart,” she said, in low, faltering tones.  “But it is best that he should not come here.”

“Would you like to write to him?”

“I think I should prefer your giving him my message.”

Julius understood that the subject was to proceed no further.  Sir Patrick’s letter had produced some impression on her, which the sensitive nature of the woman seemed to shrink from acknowledging, even to herself.  They turned back to enter the cottage.  At the door they were met by a surprise.  Hester Dethridge, with her bonnet on—­dressed, at that hour of the morning, to go out!

“Are you going to market already?” Anne asked.

Hester shook her head.

“When are you coming back?”

Hester wrote on her slate:  “Not till the night-time.”

Without another word of explanation she pulled her veil down over her face, and made for the gate.  The key had been left in the dining-room by Julius, after he had let the doctor out.  Hester had it in her hand.  She opened he gate and closed the door after her, leaving the key in the lock.  At the moment when the door banged to Geoffrey appeared in the passage.

“Where’s the key?” he asked.  “Who’s gone out?”

His brother answered the question.  He looked backward and forward suspiciously between Julius and Anne.  “What does she go out for at his time?” he said.  “Has she left the house to avoid Me?”

Julius thought this the likely explanation.  Geoffrey went down sulkily to the gate to lock it, and returned to them, with the key in his pocket.

“I’m obliged to be careful of the gate,” he said.  “The neighborhood swarms with beggars and tramps.  If you want to go out,” he added, turning pointedly to Anne, “I’m at your service, as a good husband ought to be.”

After a hurried breakfast Julius took his departure.  “I don’t accept your refusal,” he said to his brother, before Anne.  “You will see me here again.”  Geoffrey obstinately repeated the refusal.  “If you come here every day of your life,” he said, “it will be just the same.”