Barbara looked from him to young Harding. His dark eyes were ominous, he was only waiting, breathlessly, till Mr. Hayes should be compelled to pause for breath. "I hope you don't mean to imply, sir--" he began, and Barbara perceived that not only had she failed to avert a collision, but that, by her thoughtless mention of the woman of the future, she had introduced the precise subject on which the two men were most furiously at variance. Thenceforward she merely glanced from one to the other as the noisy battle raged, watching in dumb suspense as one might watch the rising of a tide. Mr. Hayes had been thoroughly cross all day, and had not forgiven Reynold's rudeness of the evening before. Under cover of his argument he was saying all the irritating things he could think of, while Harding's harsher voice broke through his shrill-toned talk with rough contradictions. After a time Barbara was obliged to leave them, and she went back to the drawing-room with a sinking heart. She had been uneasy the night before, but that was nothing to this. How earnestly she wished Mr. Pryor back again! She was pitiless, she would have flung the gentle flaccid little clergyman between the angry combatants without a moment's hesitation, if she could only have brought him there by the force of her desire. Happily for Mr. Pryor, however, he was safe in his study, putting away the Amalekites at the bottom of the drawer, till their turn should come again. At last when Barbara was in despair at the lateness of the hour, she sent one of the maids to tell the gentlemen that coffee was ready, and crept into the hall behind her messenger to hear the result. At the opening of the door there was a stormy clamour, and then a sudden silence. It was closed again, and the maid returned. "Master says, Miss, will you send it in?" The last hope was gone, she could do nothing more but pour out the coffee, and wish with all her heart it were an opiate.