‘Yes, something else has happened.’

‘I knew it.’

‘How did you—?’

‘I felt it.  You have met her again.’

Again he was speechless.  Beatrice asked—­

‘Does she live in London?’

‘She does.’

‘You have met her, and have—­have wished that you were free?’

‘Beatrice, I have done worse.  I have acted as though I were free.’

She shook, as if a blow had fallen upon her.  Then a smile came to her lips.

‘You have asked her again to be your wife?’

‘I have.’

‘And she has consented?’

’Because I deceived her at the same time that I behaved dishonourably to you.’

She fixed upon him eyes which had a strange inward look, eyes veiled with reverie, vaguely troubled, unimpassioned.  It was as though she calmly readjusted in her own mind the relations between him and herself.  The misery of Wilfrid’s situation was mitigated in a degree by mere wonder at her mode of receiving his admissions.  This interview was no logical sequence upon the scene of a week ago; and the issue then had been, one would have thought, less provocative of demonstration than to-day’s.

Directness once more armed her gaze, and again he was powerless to meet it.  Still no resentment, no condemnation.  She asked—­

‘It is your intention to marry soon?’

He could not reply.

‘Will you let me see you once more before your marriage?’ she continued.  ‘That is, if I find I wish it.  I am not sure.  I may or may not.’

It was rather a debate with herself than an address to him.

‘May I leave you now, Beatrice?’ he said, suddenly.  ’Every drop of blood in me is shame-heated.  In telling you this, I have done something which I thought would be beyond my force.’

‘Yes,’ she murmured, ‘it will be better if we part now.’

She rose and watched him as he stepped to the table and took his hat.  There was a moment’s hesitation on either side, but Beatrice did not offer her hand.  She stood superbly, as a queen might dismiss one from whom her thoughts were already wandering.  He bowed, with inward self-mockery, and left her.

Some hours later, when already the summer evening had cloaked itself, Wilfrid found himself wandering by the river, not far from Hammersmith.  The influence of a great water flowing from darkness into darkness was strong upon him; he was seeking for a hope in the transitoriness of all things earthly.  Would not the hour come when this present anguish, this blood-poisoning shame, would have passed far away and have left no mark?  Was it not thinking too grandiosely to attribute to the actions of such a one as himself a tragic gravity?  Was there not supernal laughter at the sight of him, Wilfrid Athel, an English gentleman, a member of the Lower House of the British Parliament, posing as the arbiter of destinies?  What did it all come to?  An imbroglio on the threshold