But he was experienced in flirtation as well as in love, and he had far too much tact not to know that her summons had been dictated by some feeling which was not affection. She was obliged to take the hand he held out so humbly, and his deferential attitude somewhat disarmed her. “I got your note only just in time, Mrs. Braithwaite: I was going down to Kirby Park to see some horses a friend of mine has in training there.” “I am sorry if my note interfered with your day’s arrangements. You should have sent me a line to say you were engaged.” “I am never engaged when you send for me. You must know that by this time.” Annie raised her head haughtily, while he continued: “It is more than eight months now since you told me I was the only person in the world you could depend upon, and I have never failed you yet.” This allusion was embarrassing, and Annie could only murmur: “You have always been very kind.” “And you have put my kindness to some hard tests, haven’t you? You have snubbed me, you have confided in me--at least you appeared to do so: you have encouraged me to love you----” “No, Mr. Cooke; I am quite innocent of any such intention.” “Then your innocence served you better than any coquetry could have done, Mrs. Braithwaite. Having innocently encouraged me to love you, you innocently allowed me to tell you so, with only such vague suggestions of ‘an obstacle’ as served to make me more anxious to win you. When you mysteriously left the company, you had managed to leave me not altogether without hope; when I saw you again, here in town, you managed, without compromising yourself in any way, to make that hope stronger, and it was only when I met the ‘obstacle’ for the first time outside your door that I was allowed to discover that it had any real existence. If you had left me alone then,” continued Aubrey, in a lower voice, his agitation betraying itself, in spite of his efforts to repress it, in convulsive movements of his features and his hands, “I might at least have thought that you felt some shame at the way in which you had treated me; but you wrote me a little note just in the old way, as if the old relations between us were possible. I knew your husband was away again; it was easy for me to see by the way you met him that you hated him. I took your summons, when I at last knew the circumstances of your position, and of mine to you, as any man would have taken it. You had deceived your husband, you had deceived me; you were not the good, true woman I had thought you. Still, if you wanted me back, I cared enough about you still to come, but not on the old terms. That was impossible. You were rather reserved; I thought it a trick of coquetry, naturally enough. I sent you flowers and notes, such as I have sent to other women far less treacherous, but without any of your pretensions to immaculate conduct. To my surprise, you assume in return an attitude of the most rigid dignity and outraged