Changing its form, now hostile to her husband instead of with him, the same temper showed in all the events which led up to the birth of little Frank: its presence proved that her madness over Blake was no isolated incident, but rather the crown of her development and the truest interpreter of a character empty of worth, strength, or stability. Many bitter hours brought her to this recognition; but when light came, the very temper which she condemned was in her still, and turned the coolness of recognition and analysis into an extravagant heat of scorn and self-contempt. What was the conclusion? Was she to throw herself at Grantley's feet, proclaiming penitence, imploring pardon, declaring love? "No, no!" she cried. That would be so easy, so short a cut, so satisfying to her roused feelings. She put the notion from her in horror; it was the suggestion of her old devil in a new disguise. Her love for Grantley had bitten too deep into her nature to be treated like that, with that levity and frivolity of easy impulse, that violence of headstrong emotion, those tempests of feeling so remote from true sincerity of heart. The cure did not lie in pampering sick emotions into a plump semblance of healthy life. Where did it lie, if it were possible at all? It must lie in the most difficult of all tasks--a change not of other people or of their bearing and feelings towards her, but a change of herself and of her own attitude towards others and towards the world, and in her judgment and her ruling of herself. If things were to go differently with her, she must be different. The arrogance of her nature must be abated, the extravagant claims she had made must be lowered. The thought struck on her almost with despair. So hard seemed the lesson, so rough the path. And it seemed a path which must be trodden alone. It was not as the easy pleasant road of emotion, beguiled by enchanting companionship, strewn with the flowers of fancy, carpeted with pleasure. This way was hard, bleak, and solitary. Merely to contemplate it chilled her. Even that happiness with her child, which had so struck Christine and afforded matter for one of those keen thrusts at Grantley Imason, appeared to her in a suspicious guise. She could not prevent it nor forgo it--nature was too strong; but she yielded to it with qualms of conscience, and its innocent delights were spoilt by the voice of self-accusation and distrust. Could it be real, genuine, true in the woman who had deserted the child and been indifferent to his fate?