She was wearing the little gold bangle which Julian had given her on her birthday--the one which Miss Pomeroy had helped him to choose--and she was turning it on her wrist with tender, contemplative touches. She was so absorbed in her reflection that she did not hear the servant come into the room, or notice for the moment that the girl was standing beside her with a letter. She started at last, and looked up; took the letter, and opened it carelessly, without looking at it, as the woman took away the tea-table. “DEAR COUSIN HERMIA, “Unless I hear from you to the contrary, I propose to call on you to-morrow (Saturday), at three o’clock, on a matter of grave importance. “Faithfully yours, “DENNIS FALCONER.” Mrs. Romayne’s face had changed slightly as she began to read--changed and hardened--and as she finished she drew the letter through her fingers with a gesture of mere impatience, which was somehow belied by the look in her eyes. Something of that strained look had come back into them. She could not see him to-morrow, she was saying to herself briefly; she was not going to put off Maud Pomeroy; Dennis Falconer must fix another time, and she would write him a line at once. She walked quickly across to her writing table, sat down, drew out a sheet of paper and took up a pen. And then she paused. Ten minutes later her note was written, and on its way to the post, but it was not directed to Dennis Falconer. It began, “My dear Maud,” and it told Miss Pomeroy that business had “turned up” which would make it impossible for Mrs. Romayne to go to the theatre on the following afternoon, and that she enclosed the tickets hoping that Maud might be able to use them. Exactly on the stroke of three on the following afternoon the door-bell rang. Mrs. Romayne was alone in the drawing-room, apparently lazily and pleasantly enough occupied with the latest number of the latest society paper; and as the sound reached her ear her lips hardened into a thin, straight line, and her eyes flashed for a moment with a look of antagonism which was almost defiant. Then the servant announced: “Mr. Falconer!” Dennis Falconer was looking very pale; there was little colour even in his lips, and his face was set and stern. He took the hand Mrs. Romayne held out to him, and replied to her greeting in the briefest possible phrase, with no softening of a something curiously solemn and inexorable about his demeanour, though his eyes rested on her for an instant with a singular expression. He disliked and despised the woman before him, and yet at that moment he pitied her. “Sit down!” she said. “I am charmed to see you, though, do you know, you have chosen an inopportune moment. I had a very pleasant engagement for this afternoon, and I nearly put you off. So I hope the business is really very grave.”