Within, the note of gentility, of that instinctive good taste to which many greater mansions aspired in vain, was sustained.  The furniture, the pictures, the walls and carpets were true expressions of the individuality of master and mistress, of the unity of the life lived together; and the rector smiled as he detected, in a corner of the hall, a sturdy but diminutive hobby-horse—­here the final, harmonious touch.  There was the sound of a scuffle, treble shrieks of ecstasy from above, and Eleanor Goodrich came out to welcome him.

“Its Phil,” she told him in laughing despair, “he upsets all my discipline, and gets them so excited they don’t go to sleep for hours...”

Seated in front of the fire in the drawing-room, he found Alison Parr.  Her coolness, her radiancy, her complete acceptance of the situation, all this and more he felt from the moment he touched her hand and looked into her face.  And never had she so distinctly represented to him the mysterious essence of fate.  Why she should have made the fourth at this intimate gathering, and whether or not she was or had been an especial friend of Eleanor Goodrich he did not know.  There was no explanation....

A bowl of superb chrysanthemums occupied the centre of the table.  Eleanor lifted them off and placed them on the sideboard.

“I’ve got used to looking at Phil,” she explained, “and craning is so painful.”

The effect at first was to increase the intensity of the intimacy.  There was no reason—­he told himself—­why Alison’s self-possession should have been disturbed; and as he glanced at her from time to time he perceived that it was not.  So completely was she mistress of herself that presently he felt a certain faint resentment rising within him,—­yet he asked himself why she should not have been.  It was curious that his imagination would not rise, now, to a realization of that intercourse on which, at times, his fancy had dwelt with such vividness.  The very interest, the eagerness with which she took part in their discussions seemed to him in the nature of an emphatic repudiation of any ties to him which might have been binding.

All this was only, on Hodder’s part, to be aware of the startling discovery as to how strong his sense of possession had been, and how irrational, how unwarranted.

For he had believed himself, as regarding her, to have made the supreme renunciation of his life.  And the very fact that he had not consulted, could not consult her feelings and her attitude made that renunciation no less difficult.  All effort, all attempt at achievement of the only woman for whom he had ever felt the sublime harmony of desire—­the harmony of the mind and the flesh—­was cut off.

To be here, facing her again in such close proximity, was at once a pleasure and a torture.  And gradually he found himself yielding to the pleasure, to the illusion of permanency created by her presence.  And, when all was said, he had as much to be grateful for as he could reasonably have wished; yes, and more.  The bond (there was a bond, after all!) which united them was unbreakable.  They had forged it together.  The future would take care of itself.