The ache and the anger had been caused by what he had with his own eyes beheld, namely, the secret visit of Margaret to Lucian Spenser. For it was secret. Lucian had said good-by to her before them all, it had been left clearly to be supposed that they were not to see each other again; this, then, had been a clandestine meeting. Margaret was no school-girl, she was not ignorant of the rules of the world. And she was not an exception, like Garda Thorne, full of sudden impulses, with an extraordinary openness in following them; he had never thought Margaret impulsive in the least. Yet there she was; she had slipped away without the knowledge of any one, to go over to that solitary house for a farewell interview with its occupant. Of course her being there at that last moment, woman of deliberate intentions as she was, proved that an acquaintance which she had not acknowledged existed between them; for she had never shown any especial interest in Lucian in the presence of others; on the contrary, she had appeared indifferent to him, she had acted a part; they had both acted a part, and they had acted it so well that he (Winthrop) had never once suspected them. A wrath rose within him as he thought of this. He had always disapproved of Margaret in one way; but at least--so he kept telling himself--at least he had thought her entirely without traits of this kind. He had thought her cold; but he had thought, too, that she had principles, and strong ones. It was probably her principles, more than anything else, that had made her leave Lanse in the beginning; she might even be said to have been something of a martyr to them, because, with her regard for appearances, she would have infinitely preferred, of course, to have remained under the same roof with Lanse, had it been possible, to have avoided the comment which is roused by any long separation between a husband and wife, even though but that comparatively mild degree of it which follows a separation as carefully guarded and as undefined in duration as hers had been. For nothing was ever said about its being a permanent one; people might conclude, and they easily did conclude, that before long they should see Lansing Harold back again, and established somewhere with his wife as docilely as though he had never been away; this had happened in a number of cases when the separation had been even longer. Europe was full of American wives spending winters here and summers there, wives whose husbands had remained at home; it might almost be called an American method for infusing freshness into the matrimonial atmosphere, for of course they would be doubly glad to see each other, all these parted ones, when the travels should at last be over, and the hearth-fire re-established again. In this instance it was the husband who had gone. And in the mean while how well-ordered was the life led by Mrs. Harold! there was not, there never could be, a breath of reproach or comment concerning her.