“Why, you win, perhaps.”

“As you will,” says he listlessly.

His heart is still on fire.  Not a word passes his lips as they go down the path.  His eyes feel strained, hurt; they are staring—­staring always towards the end of this path, where a seat is, so hedged round with creepers that one can scarcely see it.  Will she be there?  He turns abruptly to his companion.

“I am sick of this,” says he; “I shall go no farther.”

“But your bet?”

“It is a damnable bet!” exclaims he fiercely.  “I ought to be ashamed of myself for having made it.  You win it, of course, in a sense, as I decline to go on with it; but, still, I believe that I win it in fact.”

“You are afraid,” says she, with a daring that astonishes even herself.

“I am afraid of forgetting that once I was a gentleman,” says he curtly.

“You are afraid of what is in that arbour,” returns she mercilessly.

Rylton hesitates.  To draw back is to betray disbelief in his wife; to go on is to join in a conspiracy against her.  He had started on that conspiracy in a moment of intense passion, but now his very soul revolts from it.  And yet if he draws back it will show. . . .  It will give this woman beside him the victory over the woman he has married.  And then a sudden thought comes to him.  Why not go on?  Why not put it to be proof?  Why not win his wager?  Tita is thoughtless; but it would be madness in anyone to think her vile.  It was madness in him a moment since to dream of her being alone in that small, isolated arbour with Hescott.  Much as he may revolt—­as he does revolt—­from this abominable wager he has entered into, surely it is better to go on with it and bring it to a satisfactory end for Tita than to “cry off,” and subject her to scoffs and jeers from her adversary.

“Let us go on,” says he quietly.  “I shall win my bet.  But that is nothing!  What really matters is, that I should have entered into such a wager with you or anyone.  That is a debt I shall never be able to repay—­Lady Rylton.”

His tone is bitterly self-condemnatory, but Marian has scarcely caught that.  The “Lady Rylton” has struck upon her ears, and hurt her to her heart’s core!  Oh, that she could destroy—­blot out that small usurper!

“You have regained your courage?  Come, then,” says she, in a low tone that is full of a strange mirth.

He follows her along the grassy path—­a path noiseless—­until presently, having skirted a few low bushes, he finds himself, with Marian beside him, at the southern side of the arbour.

Marian, laying her hand silently upon his arm, points through the evergreens that veil the seat within; a mocking, triumphant smile is on her lips.

There is no need for any indication on her part, however—­Rylton can see for himself.  On the low, rustic seat within the arbour is Tita—­with Hescott beside her.  The two young heads are close together.  Tita is whispering to Hescott—­something very secret, undoubtedly.  Her small face is upturned to his, and very earnest. His face.