I looked forward to this task with little relish. I had never seen her in a really bad temper, but I was certain that she could be violent. That was not all. She might break off our little affair, and my heart almost stopped beating as I thought of the possibility. It was essential, however, that I should tell her before she learned it from anyone else. A woman can always bear unpleasant news from the man she loves. I found her alone and in a bad temper, complaining loudly of her woes. She was being dunned for some bills Lionel knew nothing about. They were living too extravagantly, she declared. They knew far too many rich people. Why were old Mr. and Mrs. Holland such a long time dying? She did not suppose for one moment they enjoyed their life. How could they? She then wanted to know almost fiercely why I was not rich. I ought to pay some of her debts. It was only fair. Other people made money, why could not I? I explained that I was doing my best—that on the whole I did not think I had done badly, and that I thought I should do better as time went on. That was just it, she retorted, with some attempt at wit, time did go on. I explained with almost brutal frankness—for the sooner she knew the longer time I should have in which to conciliate her—that I proposed to marry money in the person of Miss Gascoyne. I was quite right; Sibella could be violent. At first she did not believe me; then with white, quivering lips she implored me to tell her it was not true. She was sorry she had been angry. She would retract everything she had said if I would only tell her that it was not true. It was intensely flattering to me to see how acutely she suffered. Most certainly the days of misery I had endured for her sake were amply avenged. I explained as gently as I could that it was necessary for my welfare that I should marry. It was such a chance as might not come again, and after all it need not make the least difference to us—although on this point I was in my own mind by no means sure. I saw looming up on the far distant horizon a very unpleasant and nerve-testing state of things. Poor Sibella realised with feminine quickness that the woman who has the man in her house, and who, figuratively speaking, washes, cooks, and cleans up for him, stands the best chance of securing his heart—that part of a man’s body being inextricably bound up with other and less romantic organs. Indeed, there is a community of dependence on the same flow of blood, and an identity of relation to the same scheme of physical machinery, which renders the fact inevitable. She realised the possibilities involved in my having children, and in the mutual interests which were sure to draw us together more and more as time went on. As a consequence of these deductions, she wept dismally.