Here he burst into the whole story, into the middle of it, continuing to the end, and then going back to the commencement. He left out nothing, and nobody, except Lady Sophia Entwistle. "I see," she observed. "And you've never said a word?" "Not a word." "If I were you I should still keep perfectly silent about it," she almost whispered persuasively. "It'll be just as well. If I were you, I shouldn't worry myself. I can quite understand how it happened, and I'm glad you've told me. But don't worry. You've been exciting yourself these last two or three days. I thought it was about my money business, but I see it wasn't. At least that may have brought it on, like. Now the best thing you can do is to forget it." She did not believe him! She simply discredited the whole story; and, told in Werter Road, like that, the story did sound fantastic; it did come very near to passing belief. She had always noticed a certain queerness in her husband. His sudden gaieties about a tint in the sky or the gesture of a horse in the street, for example, were most uncanny. And he had peculiar absences of mind that she could never account for. She was sure that he must have been a very bad valet. However, she did not marry him for a valet, but for a husband; and she was satisfied with her bargain. What if he did suffer under a delusion? The exposure of that delusion merely crystallized into a definite shape her vague suspicions concerning his mentality. Besides, it was a harmless delusion. And it explained things. It explained, among other things, why he had gone to stay at the Grand Babylon Hotel. That must have been the inception of the delusion. She was glad to know the worst. She adored him more than ever. There was a silence. "No," she repeated, in the most matter-of-fact tone, "I should say nothing, in your place. I should forget it." "You would?" He drummed on the table. "I should! And whatever you do, don't worry." Her accents were the coaxing accents of a nurse with a child--or with a lunatic. He perceived now with the utmost clearness that she did not believe a word of what he had said, and that in her magnificent and calm sagacity she was only trying to humour him. He had expected to disturb her soul to its profoundest depths; he had expected that they would sit up half the night discussing the situation. And lo!--"I should forget it," indulgently! And a mild continuance of darning! He had to think, and think hard. _Tears_ "Henry," she called out the next morning, as he disappeared up the stairs. "What _are_ you doing up there?" She had behaved exactly as if nothing had happened; and she was one of those women whose prudent policy it is to let their men alone even to the furthest limit of patience; but she had nerves, too, and they were being affected. For three days Henry had really been too mysterious! He stopped, and put his head over the banisters, and in a queer, moved voice answered: "Come and see."