Here in Monkshaven, it seemed as though Garth’s personality informed the very air she breathed.  The great cliff where he had his dwelling frowned at her from across the bay whenever she looked out of her window, his name was constantly on the lips of those who made up her little circle of friends, and every day she was haunted by the fear of meeting him.  Or, worse than all else, should that fear materialize, the torment of the almost hostile relationship which had replaced their former friendship had to be endured.

The invitation to join the Durwards in London had come at an opportune moment, offering, as it did, a way of escape from the embarrassments inseparable from the situation.  Moreover, amid the distractions and bustle of the great city it would be easier to forget for a little her burden of pain and humiliation.  There is so much time for thinking—­and for remembering—­in the leisurely tranquillity of country life.

Sara would have accepted the invitation without hesitation, but that there seemed to her certain reasons why her absence from Sunnyside just now was inadvisable—­reasons based on her loyalty to Doctor Dick and the trust he had reposed in her.

For the last few weeks she had been perplexed and not a little worried concerning Molly’s apparent accession to comparative wealth.  Certain small extravagances in which the latter had recently indulged must have been, Sara knew, beyond the narrow limits of her purse, and inquiry had elicited from Selwyn the fact that she had received no addition to her usual allowance.

Molly herself had light-heartedly evaded all efforts to gain her confidence, and Sara had refrained from putting any direct question, since, after all, she was not the girl’s guardian, and her interference might very well be resented.

She was uneasily conscious that for some reason or other Molly was in a state of tension, alternating between abnormally high spirits and the depths of depression, and the recollection of that unpleasant little episode of her indebtedness to Lester Kent lingered disagreeably in Sara’s mind.

She had seen the man once, in Oldhampton High Street—­Molly, at that time still clothed in penitence, had pointed him out to her—­and she had received an unpleasing impression of a lean, hatchet face with deep-set, dense-brown eyes, and of a mouth like that of a bird of prey.

She felt reluctant to go away and leave things altogether to chance, and finally, unable to come to any decision, she carried Elisabeth’s letter down to Selwyn’s study and explained the position.

His face clouded over at the prospect of her departure.

“We shall miss you abominably,” he declared.  “But of course”—­ruefully—­“I can quite understand Mrs. Durward’s wanting you to go back to them for a time, and I suppose we must resign ourselves to being unselfish.  Only you must promise to come back again—­you mustn’t desert us altogether.”