'But what's the use of his coming if you can't get out? A man always expects a girl to be able to go out with him. The "hag" is sure to be about, and even if you did manage to give her the slip, there's your husband. Lord! I hadn't thought of that before. What damned luck! Don't you wish he'd get ill again? Another fit of asthma would suit us down to the ground.' The blood rushed to Kate's face, and snapping nervously with the scissors in the air, she said: 'I don't know how you can bring yourself to speak in that way. How can you think that I would have my husband ill so that I might go to the theatre with Mr. Lennox? What do you fancy there is between us that makes you say such a thing as that?' 'Oh, I really don't know,' Miss Hender answered with a toss of her head; 'if you're going to be hoighty-toighty I've done.' Kate thought it very provoking that Hender could never speak except coarsely, and it would have given her satisfaction to have said something sharp, but she had let Hender into a good many of her secrets, and it would be most inconvenient to have her turn round on her. Not, indeed, that she supposed she'd be wicked enough to do anything of the kind, but still---- And influenced by these considerations, Kate determined not to quarrel with Hender, but to avoid speaking to her of Dick. Even with her own people she maintained an attitude of shy reserve until Dick arrived, declining on all occasions to discuss the subject, whether with her husband or mother-in-law. 'I don't care whether he comes or not; decide your quarrels as you like, I've had enough of them,' was her invariable answer. This air of indifference ended by annoying Ralph, but she was willing to do that if it saved her from being forced into expressing an opinion--that was the great point; for with a woman's instinct she had already divined that she would not be left out of the events of the coming week. But there was still another reason. She was a little ashamed of her own treachery. Otherwise her conscience did not trouble her; it was crushed beneath a weight of desire and expectancy, and for three or four days she moved about the house in a dream. When she met her husband on the stairs and he joked her about the roses in her cheeks, she smiled curiously, and begged him to let her pass. In the workroom she was happy, for the mechanical action of sewing allowed her to follow the train of her dreams, and drew the attention of those present away from her. She had tried her novels, but now the most exciting failed to fix her thoughts. The page swam before her eyes, a confusion of white and black dots, the book would fall upon her lap in a few minutes, and she would relapse again into thinking of what Dick would say to her, and of the hours that still separated them. On Sunday, without knowing why, she insisted on attending all the services. Ralph in no way cared for this excessive devotion, and he proposed to take her for a walk