So strong is her determination to avoid an _esclandre_, and so masterly is her manner of carrying out her will, that both men instinctively obey her. Sir Penthony lowers his eyes and shifts his aggressive position; Lowry, with bent head, and without another word, walks away from her down the garden-path out of the gate, and disappears--for years. When he has quite gone, Sir Penthony turns to her. "Is this the way you amuse yourself?" he asks, in a compressed voice. "Do not reproach me," murmurs she, hurriedly; "I could not bear it now." She speaks clearly, but her tone has lost its firmness, because of the little tremor that runs through it, while her face is white as one of the pale blossoms she holds within her hand. "Besides, it is not deserved. Were you long here before you spoke?" "Long enough." With a world of meaning in his tone. "Then you heard my exculpation. 'Cold as ice,' he called me. And he was right. As I am to you, Sir Penthony, so am I to all men. No one yet has touched my heart." "For myself I can answer," replies he, bitterly; "but for the others----" "Not another word," she breaks in, vehemently. "Do not say--do not even hint at--what I might find it impossible to forgive. Not even to you will I seek to justify myself on such a point. And you," she says, tears of agitation arising from all she has undergone, mingled with much pent-up wounded feeling, coming thickly into her eyes, "you should be the last to blame me for what has happened, when you remember who it was placed me in such a false position as makes men think they may say to me what they choose." "You are unjust," he answers, nearly as white as herself. "I only followed out your wishes. It was your own arrangement; I but acceded to it." "You should not have done so," cries she, with subdued excitement. "You were a man of the world, capable of judging; I was a foolish girl, ignorant of the consequences that must follow on such an act. Our marriage was a wretched mistake." "Cecil, you know you can escape from your false position as soon as you choose. No one loves you as I do." "Impossible." Coldly. "In this world a thing once done can never be undone. Have you lived so long without learning that lesson?" As she speaks she turns from him, and, walking quickly away, leaves him alone in the garden. Much as he has grown to love her, never until now has the very tenderness of affection touched him,--now, when the laughter-loving Cecil has changed for him into the feeling, accusing woman; although a woman dead to him, with a heart locked carefully, lest he should enter it. How can he tell, as she goes so proudly along the garden-path, that her bosom is heaving with shame and unconfessed longing, and that down her cheeks--so prone to dimple with joyous laughter--the bitter tears are falling?