Then it all came back to her in a moment. She had resented his departure without a word--now she saw how he had been bound in honour not to speak it. She had felt proud, hurt and angry, while all the time he had been crushed beneath an accumulation of ruin and the woe that it involved. How she loved him now--how her heart went out to him in his adversity as it would never have done in his prosperity--how she longed and thirsted to be with him in this dark hour of his distress! All those bright, beautiful summer months passed before her, with their golden hours of love and sweetness and peace--and now! Those first furtive glances exchanged in the church, that accidental meeting on the beach, and the many rambles and long hours together, all rose up to mock her--and the moment when she had tottered between life and death on the slippery cliff path--with him. And now he was gone--gone for ever--and she was left. CHAPTER TWENTY TWO. WHAT WANDSBOROUGH SAID. It may seem strange that to a man of Dr Ingelow's standard of principle and pronounced beliefs, such a cordial intimacy as that which had sprung up between himself and Roland Dorrien should be possible; still more so, that apart from the drawbacks we have narrated, and which were purely mundane, he should be ready to accept him as a son-in-law. Yet he was-- and without prejudice to his own principles. No man living was more thoroughly free from bigotry than the rector of Wandsborough. Principle was one thing--sitting on the judgment seat, quite another. So, although he suspected Roland Dorrien's private opinions to border very closely upon infidelity, yet he did not consider him a subject for social ostracism on that account. Indeed, had the man shown a devout disposition in the face of early bringing up and subsequent associations, he would have looked upon him in the light of a natural curiosity. Roland was just the sort of man whom the ordinary Anglican parson would have regarded with lofty disapproval. But then Dr Ingelow was by no means an ordinary Anglican parson. Of course, Wandsborough was not long in finding out that Roland Dorrien's place in its midst would know him no more, and its curiosity once awakened, it caught eagerly at the few "straws" floating on the wind of popular report, and proceeded to piece together many romantic and preposterous stories therewith. Dark rumours as to that stormy scene in the study at Cranston Hall began to leak out. Servants have long tongues and still longer ears, and more than one virtuous domestic had stood on mental tip-toe, pausing in his or her then occupation, to listen intently as the sound of angry voices proceeded from the dread sanctum. Before night, the story had not only permeated Cranston village, but had been whispered in Wandsborough, and Roland's abrupt departure the next day seemed a direct challenge to all tongues.