Standing in the middle of the room, as though she had suddenly started from her chair, with her hands outstretched towards him, was Clemence; and on the third finger of that thin, left hand there shone a bright gold ring. Her face was a delicate rosy red, as though with sudden joy just touched with shyness, and all the beauty which had been latent in her tired, work-worn face seemed to have been touched into vivid, almost startling life, by the hand of a great magician. By contrast with the face she turned to Julian now, the large eyes deep and glowing, the mouth trembling a little with tenderness, the face of a month ago, pure and sweet as it had been, would have looked like the inanimate mask of a dormant soul. The soul was awake now, quivering with consciousness; womanhood had come with a purity and beauty beyond any possibility of girlhood. Looking at her face now, it was easy to see by what means alone the latent strength of her character might be developed. He drew her into his arms with an eager, confident touch, and she yielded to him completely, clinging to him with the colour deepening in her face as he kissed it boyishly again and again. It was a fortnight only since he had kissed her first. “I was watching for you,” she said softly. “I heard your step.” He laughed exultantly and kissed her again. “I thought you’d be watching!” he said. “Though I’m earlier than I told you, do you know? Much earlier! I say, Clemence, how jolly the room looks!” It was a small room, furnished and decorated in the simplest and cheapest style; as great a contrast as could well be imagined to the rooms to which he was accustomed. But it was very clean and very comfortable-looking; and there was a homelike, restful atmosphere about it which might well have radiated from the slender figure in the plain dress, with that shining wedding-ring and lovely, flushing face. She smiled, a very sweet, pleased little smile. “Do you think so really?” she said. “I am so glad. It is that beautiful basket-chair you sent, and the flowers.” She glanced as she spoke at a pot of chrysanthemums standing on a little table in the window. Then she turned to him again, her eyes a little deprecating. “Do you think you ought to spend so much money?” she said shyly. Julian laughed, and flung his arm round her, as he surveyed the little room with a vivid air of proprietorship. Here he was master. Here his word was law. Here he was in a world of his own making, and his only fellow-creature was his subject. “It looks jolly!” he pronounced again as a final dictum. “Now, come and sit down, Clemence, and tell me what you’ve been doing since yesterday!” He settled himself into the arm-chair by the fire with a lordly air as he spoke, adding: “Come and sit on this stool by me, like the sweetest girl in the world.”