’Yes.  It would do us both good, I think.  I feel fagged, and you want a change.—­Here’s the end of March; please Heaven, another month shall see us rambling in the lanes somewhere; meantime, we’ll go to a music-hall.  Each season has its glory; if we can’t hear the lark, let us listen to the bellow of a lion-comique.—­Do you appreciate this invitation?  It means that I enjoy your company, which is more than one man in ten thousand can say of his wife.  The ordinary man, when he wants to dissipate, asks—­well, not his wife.  And I, in plain sober truth, would rather have Nancy with me than anyone else.’

‘You say that to comfort me after my vexation.’

’I say it because I think it.—­The day after to-morrow I want you to come over in the morning to see some pictures in Bond Street.  And the next day we’ll go to the theatre.’

‘You can’t afford it.’

’Mind your own business.  I remembered this morning that I was young, and that I shall not be so always.  Doesn’t that ever come upon you?’

The manuscript, fruit of such persevering toil, was hidden away, and its author spoke of it no more.  But she suffered a grave disappointment.  Once or twice a temptation flashed across her mind; if she secretly found a publisher, and if her novel achieved moderate success (she might alter the title), would not Tarrant forgive her for acting against his advice?  It was nothing more than advice; often enough he had told her that he claimed no coercive right; that their union, if it were to endure, must admit a genuine independence on both sides.  But herein, as on so many other points, she subdued her natural impulse, and conformed to her husband’s idea of wifehood.  It made her smile to think how little she preserved of that same ‘genuine independence;’ but the smile had no bitterness.

Meanwhile, nothing was heard of Horace.  The winter passed, and June had come before Nancy again saw her brother’s handwriting.  It was on an ordinary envelope, posted, as she saw by the office-stamp, at Brighton; the greater her surprise to read a few lines which coldly informed her that Horace’s wife no longer lived.  ’She took cold one evening a fortnight ago, and died after three days’ illness.’

Nancy tried to feel glad, but she had little hope of any benefit to her brother from this close of a sordid tragedy.  She answered his letter, and begged that, as soon as he felt able to do so, he would come and see her.  A month’s silence on Horace’s part had led her to conclude that he would not come, when, without warning, he presented himself at her door.  It was morning, and he stayed till nightfall, but talked very little.  Sitting in the same place hour after hour, he seemed overcome with a complete exhaustion, which made speech too great an effort and kept his thoughts straying idly.  Fanny’s name did not pass his lips; when Nancy ventured an inquiry concerning her, he made an impatient gesture, and spoke of something else.