It had seemed strange to her to hear people talking about him at the dinner that night, and once or twice her soul had sprung to arms to champion him, only to remember that her knowledge was special.  She alone of all of them understood, and she found herself exulting in the superiority.  The amazed comment when the heir to the Chiltern fortune had returned to the soil of his ancestors had been revived on his arrival in Newport.  Ned Carrington, amid much laughter, had quoted the lines about Prince Hal: 

          “To mock the expectations of the world,
          To frustrate prophecies.”

Honora disliked Mr. Carrington.

Perhaps the events of Thursday, would better be left in the confusion in which they remained in Honora’s mind.  She was awakened by penetrating, persistent, and mournful notes which for some time she could not identify, although they sounded oddly familiar; and it was not until she felt the dampness of the coverlet and looked at the white square of her open windows that she realized there was a fog.  And it had not lifted when Chiltern came in the afternoon.  They discussed literature—­but the book had fallen to the floor.  ‘Absit omen’!  If printing had then been invented, undoubtedly there would have been a book instead of an apple in the third chapter of Genesis.  He confided to her his plan of collecting his father’s letters and of writing the General’s life.  Honora, too, would enjoy writing a book.  Perhaps the thought of the pleasure of collaboration occurred to them both at once; it was Chiltern who wished that he might have her help in the difficult places; she had, he felt, the literary instinct.  It was not the Viking who was talking now.  And then, at last, he had risen reluctantly to leave.  The afternoon had flown.  She held out her hand with a frank smile.

“Good-by,” she said.  “Good-by, and good luck.”

“But I may not go,” he replied.

She stood dismayed.

“I thought you told me you were going on Friday—­to-morrow.”

“I merely set that as a probable date.  I have changed my mind.  There is no immediate necessity.  Do you wish me to go?” he demanded.

She had turned away, and was straightening the books on the table.

“Why should I?” she said.

“You wouldn’t object to my remaining a few days more?” He had reached the doorway.

“What have I to do with your staying?” she asked.

“Everything,” he answered—­and was gone.

She stood still.  The feeling that possessed her now was rebellion, and akin to hate.

Her conduct, therefore, becomes all the more incomprehensible when we find her accepting, the next afternoon, his invitation to sail on Mr. Farnham’s yacht, the ‘Folly’.  It is true that the gods will not exonerate Mrs. Shorter.  That lady, who had been bribed with Alfred Dewing, used her persuasive powers; she might be likened to a skilful artisan who blew wonderful rainbow fabrics out of glass without breaking it; she blew the tender passion into a thousand shapes, and admired every one.  Her criminal culpability consisted in forgetting the fact that it could not be trusted with children.