But Althea was not won so easily from her stronghold of duty. Nor would she, on recovering from the shock of Hubert's first proposal, consent to flee at once, putting the sea between them and Thornton Rush. Hubert pleaded strongly and well, but could gain only this point. He would return to Kennons, and dispose of his property and hers. She would remain with her husband for the present. The first time he should raise his hand against her, as he had already done, she would leave his house and procure a divorce. With this was Hubert fain to be content; and the day before the anticipated return of Thornton Rush, after his absence of three weeks, he left Vine Cottage and the sad-faced lady who dwelt therein, confident that ere many months he would have Althea as his wife, and sweet revenge upon his old-time enemy. CHAPTER XXIV. JEALOUSY. Naturally, Althea was a changed person in the eyes of her husband. A man less jealously disposed might have attributed this to the sudden death of an only beloved child. But to Thornton, the knowledge that Hubert Lisle, a man his superior in mental, moral and personal accomplishments, had associated with Althea during almost the whole period of his absence, this knowledge, we say, was to Thornton as gall and wormwood. "And how did you like your cousin?" he questioned with assumed carelessness. Had Althea answered equally carelessly, "Oh! very well," she would have aroused suspicion, for she well understood her husband. So she said with enthusiasm: "I liked him very much indeed. I wish you could have met him. He is very agreeable and most intelligent." "You speak as if you thought I was a stranger to him. I have seen Hubert Lisle before to-day!" "But you have not seen him of late. A six years residence abroad must have changed him greatly." "Umph! Your cousin is not the first person who has crossed the Atlantic, as you would have me infer. At all events, he is a sneak and a coward to stay in my house more than two weeks, and decamp just before I was expected." Althea was silent. "A sneak and a coward, I repeat; what have you to say to that?" demanded Thornton, his eyes blazing like coals of fire. "Nothing," said the wife, indifferently. "Nothing! By Mars! do you answer _nothing_, when I ask you a civil question? It is well he did not let me find him here; it is not the first insult he would have got from me, and perhaps something worse. If there's a person on earth I hate worse than Sharp, it is that self-conceited Hubert Lisle. He is a puppy, an upstart, vain as a woman, and deep and false as perdition itself." He waited as if expecting a reply. None came; he glanced sideways to his wife, and continued: