Shortly after Quarrier’s arrival at Polterham, he was back again.  Daily he had repented his engagement, yet as often had congratulated himself on the windfall thus assured to him.  Before going to the Mumbrays, he called upon Mrs. Quarrier, whom, as it chanced, he found alone.  To Lilian his appearance was a shock, for in the contentment of the past week she had practically forgotten the existence of this man who shared her secret.  She could not look him in the face.

Glazzard could be trusted in points of tact.  He entered with a bright face, and the greetings of an old friend, then at once began to speak of his own affairs.

“Have you heard that I am going to be married?”

“Denzil told me when he received your letter.”

“I am afraid Miss Mumbray will hardly belong to your circle, but as Mrs. Glazzard—­that will be a different thing.  You won’t forbid me to come here because of this alliance?”

Lilian showed surprise and perplexity.

“I mean, because I am engaged to the daughter of a Tory.”

“Oh, what difference could that possibly make?”

“None, I hope.  You know that I am not very zealous as a party-man.”

In this his second conversation with Lilian, Glazzard analysed more completely the charm which she had before exercised upon him.  He was thoroughly aware of the trials her nature was enduring, and his power of sympathetic insight enabled him to read upon her countenance, in her tones, precisely what Lilian imagined she could conceal.  Amid surroundings such as those of the newly furnished house, she seemed to him a priceless gem in a gaudy setting; he felt (and with justice) that the little drawing-room at Clapham, which spoke in so many details of her own taste, was a much more suitable home for her.  What could be said of the man who had thus transferred her, all (or chiefly) for the sake of getting elected to Parliament?  Quarrier had no true appreciation of the woman with whose life and happiness he was entrusted.  He was devoted to her, no doubt, but with a devotion not much more clairvoyant than would have distinguished one of his favourite Vikings.

Glazzard, whilst liking Denzil, had never held him in much esteem.  Of late, his feelings had become strongly tinged with contempt.  And now, with the contempt there blended a strain of jealousy.

True that he himself had caught eagerly at the hope of entering Parliament; but it was the impulse of a man who knew his life to be falling into ruin, who welcomed any suggestion that would save him from final and fatal apathy—­of a man whose existence had always been loveless—­who, with passionate ideals, had never known anything but a venal embrace.  In Quarrier’s position, with abounding resources, with the love of such a woman as this, what would he not have made of life?  Would it ever have occurred to him to wear a mask of vulgar deceit, to condemn his exquisite companion to a hateful martyrdom, that he might attain the dizzy height of M.P.-ship for Polterham?