“Rosamund,” he said,—­that stillness within him forbade any preparation, any “leading up,”—­“I’ve joined the City Imperial Volunteers.”

“The City Imperial Volunteers?” she said.

He knew by the sound of her voice that she had not grasped the meaning of what he had done.  She looked surprised, and a question was in her brown eyes.

“Why?  What are they?  I don’t understand.  And the Artists’ Rifles?”

“I’ve got my transfer from them.  I’ve joined for the war.”

“The war?  Do you mean——?”

She came up to him, looking suddenly intent.

“Do you mean you have volunteered for active service in South Africa?”

“Yes.”

“Without consulting me?”

Her whole face reddened, almost as it had reddened when she spoke to him about the death of her mother.

“Yes.  I haven’t signed on yet, but the doctor has passed me.  I’m to be sworn in at the Guildhall on the fourth, I believe.  We shall sail very soon, almost directly, I suppose.  They want men out there.”

He did not know how bruskly he spoke; he was feeling too much to know.

“I didn’t think you could do such a thing without speaking to me first.  My husband, and you——!”

She stopped abruptly, as if afraid of what she might say if she went on speaking.  Two deep lines appeared in her forehead.  For the first time in his life Dion saw an expression of acute hostility in her eyes.  She had been angry, or almost angry with him for a moment in Elis, when he broke off the branch of wild olive; but she had not looked like this.  There was something piercing in her expression that was quite new to him.

“I felt I ought to do it,” he said dully.

“Did you think I should try to prevent you?”

“No.  I scarcely knew what I thought.”

“Have you told your mother?”

“No.  I had to tell Uncle Biron because of the business.  Nobody else knows.”

And then suddenly he remembered Beattie.

“At least I haven’t told any one else.”

“But some one else does know—­knew before I did.”

“I saw Beattie just now, as I said.  I believe she guessed.  I didn’t tell her.”

“But how could she guess such a thing if you gave her no hint?”

“That’s just what I have been wondering.”

Rosamund was silent.  She went away from him and stood by the fire, turning her back to him.  He waited for a moment, then he went to the hearth.

“Don’t you think perhaps it’s best for a man to decide such a thing quite alone?  It’s a man’s job, and each man must judge for himself what he ought to do in such a moment.  If you had asked me not to go I should have felt bound to go all the same.”

“But I should have said ‘Go.’  Then you never understood me in Greece?  All our talks told you nothing about me?  And now Robin is here—­you thought I should ask you not to go!”