She knelt down beside him, looking into his face with passionate entreaty in hers. "John!" she said, "I can't make you understand, but if you love me,--ever so little--don't, don't beg of--of this man. Surely we have taken enough! You have some money of your own,--indeed I would rather starve! It would kill me if you took advantage of,--of his kindness." Then, seeing the hopelessness of rousing sympathy in him, she buried her face against the arm of his chair with a sob of pain. "I'll tell you what I do know, Belle," he answered kindly enough. "It was a confounded shame of Marsden to upset your nerves by popping up like a Jack-in-the-box. You're not a bit strong yet. Go and lie down till breakfast-time, and leave me to settle it. Why, you little goose, you don't think I'm going down on my knees to beg of any man! I am only, very wisely, going to take advantage of the natural strength of the position. It isn't as if you had ever cared a button for him, you know." Something like a flash of lightning shot down from heaven on poor Belle, shrivelling up all her strength. She crept away to her room, and there, with flaming cheeks, paced up and down wondering why the sky didn't fall on the house and kill every one; every one but Philip. The memory of the night before had come back to fill her with shame and doubt, and yet with a great certainty. When had she felt so happy, so content? When had she talked to John, straight out from her very heart, as she had talked to Philip? What must he have thought? That she had been seeking to please him; as John called it, trying to play her cards well? No! he would not think such things; and yet the alternative was even less honourable to her. What had possessed her? She, John's wife, who had tried,--who had always tried so hard to be content! How had this inconceivable thing come about? Preposterous! Absurd; it had not come about; it could not, should not, must not be. Yet, after all, what was the use in denying it? Philip stood far above John in her Pantheon. She had known that for months. But then it was allowable to canonise the dead. Why had he come back? Above all, why had he brought his saintship with him? So the circle of passionate resentment at fate, and still more passionate contempt for herself, went round and round, bringing no conclusion. She would have liked to throw herself on her bed and cry her eyes out; but, trivial yet insuperable barrier to this relief, it was too near breakfast-time for tears, since no one must guess at her trouble.