And at last he was obliged to own that his inability to follow his established precedent was due to some moral deficiency, a species of cowardice which he could only vaguely analyse, but which was closely connected with his reluctance to isolate himself among the loquacious herd of those who sought for health or pleasure.  If Oswyn would have accompanied him to the Riviera he would have gone; but Oswyn was not to be induced to forsake his beloved city, and so he stayed, telling himself that each week was to be the last.

On a bright day, when spring seemed to be within measurable distance in spite of the cold, he made an expedition with Margot to Kensington Gardens; and they passed, on their way through the Park, the seat on which he had rested after his interview with Lady Garnett on that far-away October evening—­the memory struck him now as of another life.  It was frosty to-day, and the seat raised itself forlornly from quite a mound of snow.  And when they left the Gardens he hailed a cab, and, before they had reached the Circus on their homeward journey, bade the man turn and drive northward, up Orchard Street and into Grove Road.

It was dusk now, and there were bright touches of light in the windows of the low, white house, which he glanced at almost surreptitiously as they passed, and two carriages waited before the outer door.

“My dear child,” he remarked suddenly to the little girl, who was growing almost frightened by his frowning silence, “you should always, always remember that when a man has made a fool of himself, the best thing he can do is to clear out, and not return to his folly like the proverbial dog!”

Margot looked solemnly puzzled for a moment, and then laughed, deciding boldly that this was a new and elaborate game—­a joke, perhaps—­which she was too little to understand, but which politeness and good-fellowship alike required her at least to appear to appreciate.  They were great friends already, these two.  Children always recognised an ally in the man who made so few friends among his peers, and for children—­especially for pretty children of a prettiness which accorded with his own private views—­Rainham had an undeniable weakness.

On slack days—­and they were always slack now—­loungers about the precincts of the dock often caught a glimpse of the child’s fair hair above the low level of the dark bow-window which leaned outwards from Rainham’s room; and the foreman had even gone so far as to suggest that his master was bringing her up to the business.  “Pays us for looking after her,” he confided to his wife, “and looks after her himself!”

Mrs. Bullen laughed and then sighed, being a soft-hearted woman, and inclined to grieve over their impending desertion of their unbusinesslike master.

“Mr. Philip couldn’t do more for her if he was her own father,” she acknowledged appreciatively.

Whereat Bullen had smiled with the superior air of one who knew—­of one who had been down to the sea in ships, and was versed in the mysteries of the great world, of fathers and of children.