"Well, I hope to goodness she won't go and disturb Miss Beatty," grumbled Roger; and and then, half to himself, half to his companion, as the butler departed--"I don't believe she missed her train; she's one of the cool sort--does jolly well what she likes! I say, Colonel, do you like 'lady helps'? I don't!" Half an hour later, Roger, having said good-night to his guest ten minutes before, was mounting the stairs on his own way to bed, when he heard in the distance the sound of a closing door and the rustle of a woman's dress. Nurse Farmer, he supposed, who had been gossiping with Daphne. His face, as the candle shone upon it, expressed annoyance. Vaguely, he resented the kind of intimacy which had grown up lately between Daphne and her child's nurse. She was not the kind of person to make a friend of; she bullied Beatty; and she must be got rid of. Yet when he entered his wife's room, everything was dark, and Daphne was apparently sound asleep. Her face was hidden from him; and he moved on tiptoe so as not to disturb her. Evidently it was not she who had been gossiping late. His mother, perhaps, with her maid. CHAPTER VIII In the course of that night Roger Barnes's fate was decided, while he lay, happily sleeping, beside his wife. Daphne, as soon as she heard his regular breathing, opened the eyes she had only pretended to close, and lay staring into the shadows of the room, in which a nightlight was burning. Presently she got up softly, put on a dressing-gown, and went to the fire, which she noiselessly replenished; drawing up a chair, she sank back into it, her arms folded. The strengthening firelight showed her small white face, amid the masses of her dark hair. Her whole being was seething with passionate and revengeful thought. It was as though with violent straining and wrenching the familiar links and bulwarks of life were breaking down, and as if amid the wreck of them she found herself looking at goblin faces beyond, growing gradually used to them, ceasing to be startled by them, finding in them even a wild attraction and invitation. [Illustration: "Her whole being was seething with passionate and revengeful thought."]