house in Park Lane, when he was quite a young man; or from his own house in Montpellier Square in those four years of married life!  And, to-night, making up his mind to free himself if he could of that long useless marriage tie, he took a fancy to walk on, in at Hyde Park Corner, out at Knightsbridge Gate, just as he used to when going home to Irene in the old days.  What could she be like now?—­how had she passed the years since he last saw her, twelve years in all, seven already since Uncle Jolyon left her that money?  Was she still beautiful?  Would he know her if he saw her?  ‘I’ve not changed much,’ he thought; ’I expect she has.  She made me suffer.’  He remembered suddenly one night, the first on which he went out to dinner alone—­an old Malburian dinner—­the first year of their marriage.  With what eagerness he had hurried back; and, entering softly as a cat, had heard her playing.  Opening the drawing-room door noiselessly, he had stood watching the expression on her face, different from any he knew, so much more open, so confiding, as though to her music she was giving a heart he had never seen.  And he remembered how she stopped and looked round, how her face changed back to that which he did know, and what an icy shiver had gone through him, for all that the next moment he was fondling her shoulders.  Yes, she had made him suffer!  Divorce!  It seemed ridiculous, after all these years of utter separation!  But it would have to be.  No other way!  ’The question,’ he thought with sudden realism, ’is—­which of us?  She or me?  She deserted me.  She ought to pay for it.  There’ll be someone, I suppose.’  Involuntarily he uttered a little snarling sound, and, turning, made his way back to Park Lane.

CHAPTER V

JAMES SEES VISIONS

The butler himself opened the door, and closing it softly, detained Soames on the inner mat.

“The master’s poorly, sir,” he murmured.  “He wouldn’t go to bed till you came in.  He’s still in the diningroom.”

Soames responded in the hushed tone to which the house was now accustomed.

“What’s the matter with him, Warmson?”

“Nervous, sir, I think.  Might be the funeral; might be Mrs. Dartie’s comin’ round this afternoon.  I think he overheard something.  I’ve took him in a negus.  The mistress has just gone up.”

Soames hung his hat on a mahogany stag’s-horn.

“All right, Warmson, you can go to bed; I’ll take him up myself.”  And he passed into the dining-room.

James was sitting before the fire, in a big armchair, with a camel-hair shawl, very light and warm, over his frock-coated shoulders, on to which his long white whiskers drooped.  His white hair, still fairly thick, glistened in the lamplight; a little moisture from his fixed, light-grey eyes stained the cheeks, still quite well coloured, and the long deep furrows running to the corners of the clean-shaven lips, which