But now she wondered why she did not love him. She had been surprised by the vehemence of the tone in which she had said, 'I cannot bear Mrs. Hennifer.' It was not merely the irrational petulance of a childish mind resenting disapproval. Why did she not like her? Had she never cared for her husband? If so, if she had force of character to strongly dislike the one and shrink so sensitively from the other, that his home sometimes became unbearable, and all her married and social obligations were sacrificed to the one dominating desire to get away from them, there must be a reverse to the picture, comparison must play its natural part in her mind, dislike of one be accented by appreciation of another, and shrinking from one by attraction to another. Had she ever loved any one as a woman can and does love? A few short minutes of vivid personal experience had proved to her how one life bears upon another, weaving a web of influence and circumstance which is completed or left incomplete by the frailty of a single thread. Was there a broken thread in Clothilde's life? Might this discord have been a harmony? The silence was not again broken before they reached home. The sun was setting as they emerged from the larch woods on to the wooden bridge that crossed the beck below the meadows. Old Lafer was above them on the hillside, its drifts of smoke wreathing against the sky. As they climbed the fields, the moors gradually came into sight, the last rays from the sun striking in a golden haze athwart the dense blue shadows that moulded them. The old house looked dark and gray. Anna scanned every window as she balanced herself on the stile. That of the parlour was wide open. She saw that Mr. Severn was neither in his arm-chair nor in the one before the secretaire at which he wrote the correspondence that he did not get through at the office. The tea-table, too, was too orderly for any one to have already had tea there. She went on into the house. His hat was not on its peg on the stand. Dinah heard her step as she worked with the kitchen door open in readiness, and, sallying forth, shook her head. 'He's none come. Hev you brought her?' she said in a loud but cautious whisper; and peering beyond her as she spoke, she caught sight of Mrs. Severn just crossing the flags. 'T' Almighty be thanked!' she ejaculated. 'And eh, Miss Anna, I've put out some honey for tea. That'll keep t' baärns so busy, what wi' smashing it, and smearing their bread, and messing theirsels, that they'll hev no time for much talk. Now go your ways upstairs and get a souse to freshen yoursel for tea. My word, _she_ looks like death! And there are some girdle-cakes, my dearie. Them's what you favour, and Master too for t' matter of that, only he mayn't be in time.'