Monica sat quite still in the darkness, turning about the ring upon her finger—the pledge of his wedded love. She was startled at hearing put into plain words the secret thought treasured deep down in her heart, but seldom looked into or analysed. Had it come to that? Did she indeed love him thus? Was that the reason she yielded up herself and her future so trustfully and willingly to him?—the reason that she no longer yearned after Trevlyn as home, so long as he was at her side? Yes, that was surely it. Beatrice had spoken no more than the truth in what she said. She did love her husband heart and soul; but did he love her too? There lay the sting—she had proved unworthy of him: he must know it and feel it. She had been near to winning his heart; but alas! she had not won it—and now, now perhaps it was too late. And yet the full truth was like a ray of sunshine in her heart. Might she not yet win his love by the depth and tenderness of her own? Something deep down within her said that the land of promise lay, after all, not so very far away. CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH. A SUMMONS TO TREVLYN. “Randolph! Randolph! Why did you not take me home when I begged so hard to go? It was cruel! cruel! And now it is too late!” This irrepressible cry of anguish burst from Monica in the first moments of a terrible, overmastering grief. An open telegram in Randolph’s hand announced the sudden death of Lord Trevlyn. He had just broken to his wife, with as much gentleness as he could, the news of this crushing sorrow. It was hardly unnatural that she should remember, in such a moment, how eloquently she had pleaded a few weeks back to be taken home to Trevlyn, yet she repented the words before they had passed her lips, for she saw they had hurt her husband. He was deeply grieved for her, his heart yearned over her, but his words were few. “Can you be ready to start, Monica, by the noon express?” She bent her head in a silent assent, and moved away as one who walks in a dream. “Poor child!” he said softly, “poor child! If only my love could make up to you for what you have lost; but alas! that is not what you want.” It was a strange, sad, silent journey, almost as sad as the one in which Randolph had brought his bride to London. He was taking her back at last to her childhood’s home. Was he any nearer to her innermost self than he had been that day, now nearly three months ago?