“Anne! do you know what a sweet thing you are? No, of course you don’t know, and that’s what make you so delicious!” Even while she thrilled from head to foot with an almost unbearable happiness, Anne remembered the price at which it was bought, and told herself that it was not too dear. “I only know I’m happy,” she whispered. “But I’m afraid of waking up and finding it’s a dream.” * * * * * Again and again, through the years as they passed, her own words came back to her. In the summer evenings at Dymfield, she thought of them. When she travelled, they often came to her as she stood before some picture in church or gallery. She thought of them sometimes at night, when on some Italian terrace she sat watching the sunset. To-day she remembered them, as she walked home through the sunshine, and mounted the stately Spanish steps towards her apartment on the heights. “Twenty years ago!” She repeated the words to herself in wonder. “It was a beautiful dream, and thank God, I never waked.” XVI Dr. Dakin was spending the night in town on his way to Paris. For the previous fortnight, urged not so much by the impressive hints concerning his duty thrown out by Mrs. Carfax, as by a curious change in his wife’s letters to him, he had been on thorns of impatience to join her in Paris, and bring her home. The serious illness of a patient, an exasperating case which always seemed on the point of mending, only to sink into another relapse, kept him prisoner. Not till the previous day had he considered it safe to telegraph for the doctor he had engaged to look after his practice during his own absence, and a still further delay had been occasioned by the necessity of meeting this man in London to explain the peculiar nature of the case under treatment. Leaving his hotel in the evening, he walked westward in search of a place to dine, meditating in a troubled fashion as he walked. His wife had been away more than three months, and he had made no effort to recall her. The visit, accepted ostensibly at least, partly on the ground of her health, was in any case to have been a long one. Then followed the plea of the cure which a certain well-known physician had prescribed, and again her husband had agreed to her wishes. He told himself to be patient. After his talk with Miss Page, he had been full of hope. But it would not do to annoy Madge by bringing her home again before she wished to come. It would be wiser to let her tire of Paris, and then when she returned, he would take the advice of a wise and charming woman, and perhaps there might yet be happiness for Madge,--and for him too. So he had waited, forcing himself to self-control through his hourly longing for her.