When her scented presence had left the room, John Derringham clasped his hands behind his head, and, before he was aware of it, his lips had murmured "Thank God!" And then Nemesis fell upon him--his schoolboy sensation of recreation-time at hand left him, and a blank sense of failure and hopeless bondage took its place. Surely he had bartered his soul for a very inadequate mess of pottage. And where would he sink to under this scorpion whip? Where would go all his fine aspirations which, even in spite of all the juggling of political life, still lived in his aims. Halcyone would have understood. "Oh! my love!" he cried. "My tender love!" Then that part of him which was strong reasserted itself. He would not give way to this repining, the thing was done and he must make the best of it. He asked for some volumes from the library. He would read, and he sent the faithful and adoring Brome to request Miss Clinker to send him up the third and fourth volume of "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." He often turned to Gibbon when he was at war with things. The perfect balance of the English soothed him--and he felt he would read of Julian, for whom in his heart he felt a sympathy. Arabella brought the volumes herself, and placed them on his table, and then went to settle some roses in a vase before she left the room. A thin slip of paper fell out of one of the books as he opened it, and he read it absently while he turned the pages. On the top was a date in pencil, and in a methodical fashion there was written in red ink: "Notes for the instruction of M. E.," and then underneath, "Subjects to be talked of at dinner to-night--Was there cause for Julian's apostasy? What appealed most to Julian in the old religions--etc., etc." For a second the words conveyed no meaning to his brain, and for something to say, he said aloud to Arabella: "This is your writing, I think, Miss Clinker. I see you have a taste for our friend Gibbon, too," and then, observing the troubled confusion of Arabella's honest face, a sudden flash came over him of memory. He recollected distinctly that upon the Sunday before his accident, they had talked at lunch of Julian the Apostate, and Mrs. Cricklander had turned the conversation, and then had referred to the subject again at dinner with an astonishing array of facts, surprising him by her erudition. He looked down at the slip again--yes, the date was right, and the red-ink heading was evidently a stereotyped one; probably Arabella kept a supply of these papers ready, being a methodical creature. And the questions!--were they for her own education? But no--Arabella was a cultivated person and would not require such things, and, on that particular Sunday, had never opened the door of her lips at either meal. "She prompts Cecilia," in a flash he thought, with a wild sense of bitter mirth. "No wonder she can reel off statistics as she does. 'Subjects to be talked of at dinner'--forsooth!"