There had come to him in these days, here, in the hard adventure with kindred spirits, in the intoxication of danger and human courage, amid all that was splendid, perhaps the more splendid for its pitiful transience, a contentment with life. He was not maimed in the spirit, though he had been sorely buffeted. His greatest ally was with him, the Future. So much subservience to the omnipotent hand of Fate had this East wrought in him, he would not rebel. If Mrs. Graham could see him now, see the change that had quieted him, instead of recalling the tumult of those days when he had turned to her in his blind agony, she might wonder at the quality of his love, at a love that surrendered and was happy in the act. "Muriel seems very happy," she wrote; "if I did not know I should think she loved him deeply; they are never apart and she seems unwearied in her service to him." But did she know? Who knew the heart of any woman and who could apportion duty, sympathy and love? Now he looked back, he saw that, tacitly, he and Muriel had loved, without obstacles, without trials. From the first dawn of instinct, from that wintry day by the copse, when unknown temptings of Nature and boyish impulse had made him gather her into his arms, they had followed the natural course of their early affection. For himself, even now, he had never doubted but that the fulfilment of that first impulse lay in his marriage to Muriel. Painfully, but frankly, he followed the remorseless logic of the facts. It had comforted his egotism, the eternal possessive instinct of man, to think that she had married in a mood of pity; what if she also married for love, suddenly awakened and all the stronger and more impetuous now it was really awakened? He saw now, that throughout he had insisted upon the requital of his love, and perhaps his dominance had won until this stronger instinct awakened in her. He had banished all thought of her unfaithfulness, all reproach for the blow he had suffered. That day, for the first time, he had written to her. It had been a hard thing to do, because he realised how kindness, understanding even, would hurt her. But it was not possible to go through life with a barrier of silence separating lives that had such great memories in common, when the morning hours had been so bright for them. He had even referred to meeting again, feeling in his heart there was nothing to forbid it; and when he had written to Vernley, he had spoken of a "phase." The very word hurt him as he wrote, but it was a surgery he had to perform, and this great distance made it easier.