Perhaps he had offended her by his silence--his two letters, which she had neither invited nor answered. That can hardly account for it, since she had not written to him of her own initiative. Their parting certainly had been discrepant: the clinging and wistfulness had been hers, though she had uttered nothing of complaint or misgiving. But perhaps he had been too gay and nonchalant, a little too much the husband secure. For a week she had shivered at her loneliness; then she had plunged anew into the flood of affairs, and had come out, as from a cold bath, braced and tingling. Round went the wheels of Wanless. The house was new-papered, painted, carpeted; every month brought new wonders to the garden. Under Glyde's tuition, seeing with his eyes, watching with his tensity of vision, she had come closely into Nature's arms. Perhaps she was unwise with the young man: the fact is she never stopped to consider him. She liked him and his queer, secret, passionate ways. She took a royal line of her own. She required much of him, and if he made much of it, she didn't know it. She dreamed no harm to him or to herself. Her absorption in the business of the moment, or the needs, was so manifest that not even the maids, who saw her frequently with the youth, could have thought harm for a second. It was just Miss Percival all over--as “keen as mustard.” Perhaps it was as much under Glyde's fostering as any other nurture that she came, during that year alone, to love the earth so well that she could appraise the worth of human love. I don't know. It was a critical year for her. As she was anything but a fool, there's no doubt that she came, before the end of that year, to know what was the matter with Glyde. She had had experience--of herself and another--and he was utterly incapable of concealing his feelings. Of course she knew what was the matter with him, and was tenderly and quietly amused. She approached him gradually, let herself play elder sister, and let him play what he chose, within severe limits, never overstepped by him, never unwatched by herself. He was a passionate, sensitive, inarticulate creature, narrow-faced, sharp-eyed, scowling and thin. He always looked cold, mostly angry, and never seemed contented, even when his plants flowered themselves to death to please him.