It is but a momentary touch, a thing of an instant, but it includes a whole world of meaning. Lady Swansdown has sprung to her feet, and is looking at him with eyes that seem to burn through the mystic darkness. She is trembling in every limb. Her nostrils are dilated. Her haughty mouth is quivering, and there--are there honest, real tears in those mocking eyes? Baltimore, too, has risen. His face is very white, very full of contrition. That he regrets his action toward her is unmistakable, but that there is a deeper contrition behind--a sense of self-loathing not to be appeased betrays itself in the anguish of his eyes. She had accused him of falsity, most falsely up to this, but now--now----His mind has wandered far away. There is something so wild in his expression that Lady Swansdown loses sight of herself in the contemplation of it. "What is it, Baltimore?" asks she, in a low, frightened tone. It rouses him. "I have offended you beyond pardon," begins he, but more like one seeking for words to say than one afraid of using them. "I have angered you----" "Do not mistake me," interrupts she quickly, almost fiercely. "I am not angry. I feel no anger--nothing--but that I am a traitor." "And what am I?" "Work out your own condemnation for yourself," says she, still with that feverish self-disdain upon her. "Don't ask me to help you. She was my friend, whatever she is now. She trusted me, believed in me. And after all----And you," turning passionately, "you are doubly a traitor, you are a husband." "In name!" doggedly. He has quite recovered himself now. Whatever torture his secret soul may impress upon him in the future, no one but he shall know. "It doesn't matter. You belong to her, and she to you." "That is what she doesn't think," bitterly. "There is one thing only to be said, Baltimore," says she, after a slight pause. "This must never occur again. I like you, you know that. I----" she breaks off abruptly, and suddenly gives way to a sort of mirthless laughter. "It is a farce!" she says. "Consider my feeling anything. And so virtuous a thing, too, as remorse! Well, as one lives, one learns. If I had seen the light for the first time in the middle of the dark ages, I should probably have ended my days as the prioress of a convent. As it is, I shouldn't wonder if I went in for hospital nursing presently. Pshaw!" angrily, "it is useless lamenting. Let me face the truth. I have acted abominably toward her so far, and the worst of it is"--with a candor that seems to scorch her--"I know if the chance be given me, I shall behave abominably toward her again. I shall leave to-morrow--the day after. One must invent a decent excuse." "Pray don't leave on Lady Baltimore's account," says he slowly, "she would be the last to care about this. I am nothing to her." "Is your wish father to that thought?" regarding him keenly. "No. I assure you. The failing I mention is plain to all the world I should have thought."