Adela was making haste to Teach the Manor, that she might read Stella’s letter She and her husband were to dine this evening with the Walthams—­a farewell meal.  With difficulty she escaped from her mother and Letty; Stella’s letter demanded a quarter of an hour of solitude.

She reached her room, and broke the envelope.  Stella never wrote at much length, but to-day there were only a few lines.

’My love to you, heart’s darling.  I am not well enough to come, and I think it likely you had rather I did not.  But in a few hours you will be near me.  Come as soon as ever you can.  I wait for you like the earth for spring.  ‘STELLA.’

She kissed the paper and put it in the bosom of her dress.  It was already time to go to her mother’s.

She found her mother and Letty with grave faces; something seemed to have disturbed them.  Letty tried to smile and appear at ease, but Mrs. Waltham was at no pains to hide the source of her dissatisfaction.

‘Did you know of that, Adela?’ she asked, with vexation.  ’About the annuity, I mean.  Had Richard spoken to you of his intention?’

Adela replied with a simple negative.  She had not given the matter a thought.

’Then he certainly should have done.  It was his duty, I consider, to tell me.  It is in express contradiction of all he has led me to understand.  What are you going to live on, I should like to know?  It’s very unlikely that he will find a position immediately.  He is absolutely reckless, wickedly thoughtless!  My dear, it is not too late even now.  I insist on your staying with us until your husband has found an assured income.  The idea of your going to live in lodgings in an obscure part of London is more than I can bear, and now it really appals me.  Adela, my child, it’s impossible for you to go under these circumstances.  The commonest decency will oblige him to assent to this arrangement.’

‘My dear mother,’ Adela replied seriously, ’pray do not reopen that.  It surely ought to be needless for me to repeat that it is my duty to go to London.’

‘But, Adela darling,’ began Letty, very timorously, ’wouldn’t it be relieving your husband?  How much freer he would be to look about, knowing you are here safe and in comfort.  I really—­I do really think mother is right.’

Before Adela could make any reply there sounded a knock at the front door; Richard came in.  He cast a glance round at the three.  The others might have escaped his notice, but Mrs. Waltham was too plainly perturbed.

‘Has anything happened?’ he asked in an offhand way.

‘I am distressed, more than I can tell you,’ began his mother-in-law.  ’Surely you did not mean what you said about the money—­’

‘Mother!’ came from Adela’s lips, but she checked herself.

Mutimer thrust his hands into his pockets and stood smiling.

‘Yes, I meant it.’

‘But, pray, what are you and Adela going to live upon?’