In a few moments it was over. The words compromising a lifetime had been said. The wedding ring gleamed upon her finger. As she passed with the others into the vestry she looked down at it in a daze. There it was and there it must remain till death parted them, a token of submission and obedience. In the vestry there were embraces, congratulations. Thornton kissed her after the gallant fashion of a man who can afford to wait for a warmer caress. Winifred threw her arms round her neck, weeping. Mrs. Farquharson kissed her in her affectionate, motherly way. George kissed her gravely on the forehead and dipped the pen in the ink for her to sign “Clytie Davenant” for the last time. Then they found themselves in the porch again, saying farewell. Caroline laughingly called her “Mrs. Hammerdyke” as they finally parted. And then the little knot of three waved their handkerchiefs as the cab drove off that took her husband and herself towards Victoria. “You are mine now, my darling,” he said, taking her hand. “All that is most mine.” “I am glad,” she murmured, returning his pressure. “Yours for always.” The commissionnaire met them at the station. He had taken their tickets, settled their luggage, engaged a carriage. A bouquet of violets lay upon the seat. Clytie flashed a quick glance at her husband. “Thank you for thinking. I love them so much.” He arranged her hot-water can and her rugs and sat down by her side, thrusting up the dividing arms impatiently. As soon as the train had moved out of the station he put his arms around her and kissed her, and spoke to her in tender, passionate words. The stop at Croydon broke the continuity of this first wedded embrace. On the platform outside the carriage window a loud altercation was in progress between the ticket-collector and a young couple who objected to pay for the ticket of a tiny terrier the woman was carrying. They were of the lower middle class, both in their Sunday clothes. She was a fair, delicate woman of some refinement; but the husband was coarse, vulgar, with the stamp of sensuality on his sharp, somewhat handsome face. Moreover, he was slightly intoxicated, and used a foul expression to qualify the collector after the official had departed. A flush rose to the young woman's forehead. “Don't, John,” she pleaded. “He's in his rights.” But the cad consigned his rights to perdition, and moved off vulgarly proclaiming his own. Clytie had heard this small scene in a life's drama and she vividly constructed the miserable tragedy. When the train moved on again she shivered, with a nameless, indefinable sense of fear. Three months ago she would have noted the scene for vigorous transference to canvas. Now the woman more than the artist was stirred. “Please don't talk--just for a little, Thornton,” she said as he began to speak. He looked at her somewhat reproachfully. She drew off her glove and put her hand into his.