In fact, in the first encounter between them, Cyril Maxon was beaten. She stood up against him, and had won her way. True, she was almost bound to; her position was so much the more favourable. Yet, however defeat came, Maxon was not accustomed to it, and did not like it. And he liked her the less for inflicting it--he used one or two hard words about her as he drove home from Hans Place--but he did not the less want to marry her. The masterful element in him became the more urgent to achieve that victory, to make up all the ground that he had lost to-day--and more. But, if he contrasted to-day's interview with his previous assumptions, it was plain that he had lost a lot of ground. What had seemed the practically certain became merely the reasonably probable. Instead of being to all intents and purposes accepted, he was told that he was only a suitor, though, no doubt, a suitor who was entitled to entertain good hopes of success. Yes, very good hopes, if nothing intervened. But he hated the trip abroad, and he hated Sir Axel Thrapston--in spite of Lady Rosaline's disclaimer of any sentimental interest in that gentleman. The mere fact of her asking for a delay made every delay dangerous, and, while she doubted at all, any man much about her might make her more doubtful. "If she throws me over now----" he muttered angrily to himself; for always in his mind, as now and then on his lips, was that 'I did it for you.' She had accepted the sacrifice of his conscience; was she now to refuse to answer his prayer? In the new light of her possibly refusing, he almost admitted the sacrifice. At any rate, he asserted, he had acted on a conclusion full of difficulty and not quite free from doubt. It was beyond question that the case of conscience might vary in aspect, according as Lady Rosaline Deering did or did not say 'Yes.' If the vanquished combatant was decidedly savage, the victorious was rather exhausted. Lady Rosaline lay prone in a luxurious arm-chair before the fire, doing nothing, feeling very tired. She had won, but a succession of such victories--a perpetual need of such victories--would be Pyrrhic in its effect on her nerves. The room seemed suddenly filled with an atmosphere of peace. She gave a little stretch, a little yawn, and nestled down farther into her big chair. Thus Sir Axel Thrapston, punctual to his half-past five and missing Cyril Maxon by some ten minutes, found her. His arrival did not disturb her sense of repose and, perhaps, rather accentuated it; for with him she had no quarrel, and about him no complication of feelings difficult to unravel. Moreover, he was an essentially peaceful person, a live-and-let-live man. She received him graciously, but without rising from the big chair. "Forgive my not getting up; I'm rather tired. You take the little chair, and draw it up." He did as he was bid. "Been doing too much?" he asked.