“You may do as you please,” she said, rising in what was intended for a stately manner from her chair, “but _I_ shall not remain in the same room with Mrs. John. Hate her, indeed! I never heard such words. ‘He that hateth his brother is a murderer!’--and nobody before ever evened me to that. I wish you good-night, John; and I hope that God will give you both better thoughts. I may forgive--but it isn’t likely I should forget.” The door closed behind the jealous wrong-headed old woman; and John, preparing mechanically to mix his nightly jorum of weak brandy-and-water, heaved a more weary sigh than had often escaped his lips. There was something touching in the sound--proceeding as it did from one so habitually (at least to outward semblance) cheerful and _insouciant_--and Honor, hearing it, suddenly felt penitent and sympathetic. “I am so sorry,” she said softly. “I know I was wrong--and, John, I should be so much happier if your mother would be kind to me. It was more that--I mean more because of her--that I seemed to care to stay away--I--” “There, there, my dear,” he said, his arm round her waist, and drawing her towards him tenderly, “don’t bother yourself any more about it. We must all try to bear and forbear; and mother is old now--and old people have their fancies. You, poor little thing,” gazing pityingly on the wet eyelashes that swept her pallid cheeks, “I would make you happy, God knows, if I could. You are such a child still--and somehow, it seems to me that you were not made for this rough life of ours;” and John, loosening the hand that pressed the slender waist, sighed again even more discontentedly than before. CHAPTER XIII. ARTHUR CHEERS UP. The news that John Beacham had carried his wife into the country, without even allowing that ill-used young woman to return to Stanwick-street, was communicated on the following morning by Colonel Norcott to his young friend, to whom he wrote a hurried note as follows: “Only fancy! John Beacham, after behaving like a bear, carried off my poor girl, just as she was, to Updown. I had half a mind to interfere; but the Derby before everything! We shall meet on the course, I suppose. If not, at the club afterwards. Good luck to Rough Diamond, and to us! We are in the same boat. Sink or swim?--with me, at least. “Yours in haste, “F. N.”