caused the people who love you sufficient distress as it is.  I don’t see that your staying here is going to make anything any easier, while things are as they are in California!’ My dear,” said Barbara with a sigh, “Francis gets that way sometimes; English people do—­there seems to be a sort of moral obligation upon them to say what’s true, no matter how outrageously rude it sounds!”

“I had no idea Captain Fox felt that way,” Julia said, touched.

“Oh, my dear!  He’s one of your warmest admirers.  Well,” Barbara went on, “of course Jim ruffled up like a turkey cock.  I didn’t dare say anything, and Francis, having done his worst, was really pretty fair.  Luckily, some other people came in, and later I went with Jim to the nursery.  Then he said to me, ’Do you think Julia’s position is equivocal, Bab?’ And I said, ’Jim, I never knew any one to care so little for public opinion as Julia.  But all the rumour and gossip, the unexplained mystery of it, are very, very hard for her.’  I said, ‘Jim, aren’t you going back?’ and he said, ‘Never.’  Then he said, ’I think Francis is right.  This way is neither one thing nor the other.  It ought to be settled.  Not,’ he said, ‘that I want to marry again!’ I said, ’Jim, you couldn’t marry again, don’t talk that way!’ He said something about my clinging to old ideas, and I said, ’Jim, don’t tell me you have given up your faith?’ He said, very airily, ’I’m not telling you anything, my dear girl, but if the law will set me free, perhaps that’s the best way of silencing Francis’s remarks about Julia’s equivocal position!’”

Julia was silent for a while, staring beyond Barbara, her eyes like those of a sick person, her face ashen.  Barbara began to feel frightened.

“So that’s it,” Julia said finally, in a tired, cold voice.

“Ju—­it’s too dreadful to hurt you this way!” Barbara said.  “But that’s not all.  The only reason I told you all this was because Jim may be coming home; he may come on in October, and want to see you.  Francis thinks—–­But it seems too cruel to let him come on and take you by surprise!”

“Oh, my God!” said Julia, in a low, tense tone, “what utter wreck I have made of my life!  Why is it,” she said, springing up and beginning to walk again, “why is it that I am so helpless, why must I sit still and let the soul be torn out of my body!  My child must grow up fatherless—­under a cloud—–­”

“Julie!  Julie!” Barbara begged, wild with anxiety, as she kept pace beside Julia on the dry brown grass.  “Dearest, don’t, or you’ll make me feel terribly for having told you!”

“Oh, no—­no,” Julia said, suddenly calm and weary.  “You had to tell me!” The two walked slowly on for a moment, in silence, then Julia added passionately:  “Oh, what a wretched, miserable business!  Oh, Bab, why do I simply have to go from one agony to another?  I’m so tired of being unhappy; I’m so wretched!” Her voice fell, the fire went out of her tone.  “I’m tired,” she said, in a voice that seemed to Barbara curiously in keeping with the flat, toneless summer twilight, the dull brown hills, the darkening sky, the dry slippery grass over which a cool swift breeze was beginning to wander.  “If Anna and I could only run away from it all!” said Julia sombrely.