‘How indeed?’ he muttered to himself. ‘And how is it to be now that we have met? I don’t know how it will end, but you shall look at me differently from that, Helena, or----’ CHAPTER III. IN THE RAIN. It was more than three weeks later. The month of August had almost come to its close. The scene was again the bright and cheerful city of Manchester, on one of its typical days. August was going out, as she often does in Lancashire, with a sullen, streaming rain, which poured on, relentlessly and unceasingly. Helena Spenceley had been struggling all the morning with her pupils, who had turned refractory, and, unable because of the rain to go out, had vented their youthful spirits in a series of experiments upon Miss Spenceley’s endurance. They were not bad children; indeed they had in them ‘the makings’ of very good children, and were, as their governess had informed Sebastian, as good as their parents would allow them to be. They had been allowed to find out that everyone and everything in the establishment was to yield to their comfort and convenience. They knew their power, and used it. The morning’s lessons were over. Usually, at twelve o’clock, Helena took her pupils for a walk, but to-day that was impossible, so they remained indoors, and she was understood to be amusing them. It was a dreary kind of amusement. She had been feeling weary and exhausted all the morning, and now, the close room, the shouting children rushing wildly about, almost overpowered her. She felt herself growing each moment more numb and stupid. At last the bell rang for Mrs. Galloway’s lunch, and the dinner of Helena and the children. Pell-mell they rushed in, and forgot for a time, in the pleasures of the table, their quarrels and disputes, relating chiefly to the possession of certain precious objects and fetishes, over which they wrangled with ever fresh acrimony and avidity. The meal was over, and Helena returned to the schoolroom. The children were to remain downstairs for an hour with their mother. Helena took a chair to the window, and, resting her chin upon her hand, looked drearily out upon the streaming rain, the dripping trees, and the misty outlines of other houses in the park. Idle tears filled her eyes, and a lump rose in her throat. She choked both back, and smiled drily and drearily to herself.