"Don't take to melodrama, Harriet, it's so unlike you, and doesn't suit you. Besides, it's too late in the day for that kind of thing now." She took no notice of the ungracious speech, but still stood looking thoughtfully at him. He rose, letting her hand drop from his shoulder, and walked up and down the room. "Stewart," she said gently, "you must not be impatient with me if I am not as ready of resource as I was. However, I think I see what ought to be done in this emergency, and I am quite sure I can do it. I will go to Amherst, find out the true state of things there, see the old woman at Poynings, who will gladly receive me as a friend of George Dallas; and then, and then only, can we decide whether this letter is to reach him or not." "By Jove, Harry, that's a splendid idea!" said Routh; "and there can't be any risk in it, for Dallas would take your doing it as the greatest kindness. _You_ not so ready of resource as you were? You're more so, my girl--you're more so." There was a little wonder in the look she turned upon him, a little surprise at the lightness of his tone, but not a ray of the pleasure which his perverted praise had once given her. "This is the best thing to do," she said, gravely, "and I will do it at once. I will go to-morrow morning." "And I will get our traps moved, and put up at the Tavistock till you come back. You can pack this evening, I suppose, Harry?" "O yes," she answered. "I shall be glad of the occupation." "And you'll do it more easily without me," said Routh, whom no crisis of events, however serious, could render indifferent to his individual comforts, and to whom the confusion of packing was an image of horror and disgust; "so I shall dine out, and leave you to your own devices. Here, you had better lock these up." He took the letters from a table on which she had laid them as she spoke, and held them towards her. She drew a step nearer to him, took the papers from his hand; then suddenly let them drop upon the floor, and flung her arms wildly round Routh's neck. "Harriet, Harriet," he said, "what's this?" as he strove to lift her face which she held pressed against his breast with terrible force. She answered him with a groan--a groan so full of anguish, that his callousness was not proof against it. "My love, my darling, my brave girl, don't, don't!" was all he could say, as he bent his head over her and held her tightly to him. For several moments she stood thus; then she lifted her white face, put up her hands, and drew his face down to hers, kissed him with kisses which thrilled him with an unknown sense of fear and doom, and, instantly releasing, left him.