“I can face the consequences,” said Annie, quietly. “I can suffer anything but being cheated, and deceived, and tricked, as I have been by both of you. I shall find out where Kirby Park is, and go there without delay.” “You will not see him there. He was there; but he is gone, and they cannot tell you where.” “Very well. Then I shall find out where he is from Muriel West.” “Go to her then--go to her; ask her, if you can stoop so low, where the flowers come from that deck her rooms--that lie in her hair. And, when you are satisfied, find out your husband, if your pride does not hold you back, and enjoy the welcome he will give you.” In the midst of her own distress Annie feared for the effect of the strong excitement under which he was laboring upon the fragile frame of the cripple, and, without any further answer to his taunts, or any more reproaches for his double-dealing, she wished him good-bye very gravely, and, taking the card from among the leaves before he could stop her, she left the room as he was struggling to reach the door to prevent her exit. It seemed a horrible thing to leave him alone, cripple that he was, in a state of such utter bodily prostration as this scene had reduced him to; but she knew that he would accept no help from her hands, and she went down the narrow dark stairs sadly and slowly, listening as she went, lest she should hear him fall. But she heard no sound from the room up-stairs, and, as she left the house and walked toward home, her thoughts turned from the miserable instrument of her husband’s treachery to Harry himself, with all her newly awakened love changed to a passionate wish for vengeance upon him for this cruel deceit. Kirby Park--Kirby Park! That was where she would go--where, in spite of Stephen’s worthless protestations, she believed that she should find her husband and be able to confront him, and sting him with the sharp taunts which rose to her lips now, which should make him writhe and start and feel shame, however callous he had become. Her passive hatred he had felt before, and had been able to afford to treat with indifference; she would see whether the active hatred into which his shameless neglect and ingratitude had turned her wistful affection would not make him feel some of the pangs he had caused her. Annie felt changed by that day’s discovery into a wicked woman, with no feelings of pity or pardon possible, who would stop at nothing in the madness of her misery. She sacrificed even her womanly dignity, in her wish to make the husband who had despised her love feel an added pang at the sight of her. She would not simply go down, hunt him out, and confound him; she would let him think it was the worthless woman he loved who was coming to see him, so that disappointment might be added to his annoyance at meeting his wife.