In short, there fell between them, if not a cloud, yet a mist which veiled each from the other, making Gervase believe that her sympathy had failed, and tormenting Madeline with the thought that his love was no longer what it was, and that she had lost her place in his life. He came to her, but he talked of nothing but his business, of the stage at which he had now arrived, of the prospect there was of coming to a conclusion. And she had so often to hurry on these long explanations, to say “Gervase, I must go. Don’t think me unkind,--I would rather stay with you a thousand times, but I _must_ go.” He would give her a look which she scarcely understood, whether it was reproach or consent. “I know, I know,” he would say, and go off heavily, never looking behind him. This lasted like a fever for weeks: he always absorbed in the business which it was so difficult to get done with; she full of wretched thoughts, thinking she had lost him, not without a feeling that he had lost himself, going on with her gaieties, which was worse. If it had but happened at another time of the year, it would not have been quite so bad; and oh, if Gervase had but stayed at home, if he had but gone into the business, if he had kept everything straight, if it had never happened at all! There came a time, however, in the middle of June, when all the entertainments were at their height, and Madeline, with a distracted mind, going “everywhere,” so far as her circle extended, doing all her father’s society duties and her own, keeping “in the swim,” as he insisted she should do, was more occupied than ever--when Gervase at last got his business completed. She heard that he had come several times when she could not see him, retreating from the door when she had visitors, or turned away when she was out. To her horror and dismay, several days elapsed thus without a meeting. She felt that at any moment she might receive a letter saying that Gervase had gone away, that he had left England, that she should see him no more. She went and came to her parties, to her engagements, at the highest tension, terrified to see upon the hall-table every time she came in the note which would pronounce this doom. Her little notes to him remained unanswered. She was told by the servants that he had called, but had not remained or left any message. Madeline’s anxiety and trouble had risen to fever-heat. He came on Sunday afternoon at last, but he was scarcely seated when some wretched partner of the night before drifted in to talk about Lady C.’s ball and the great garden-party at Valley House, and the Lord Mayor’s _fête_ at the Mansion House, while Gervase sat silent, taking no share in the vain, exceptionally vain, talk. He departed, with a hasty touch of her hand, and a murmur of “I’ll come again,” when another and another stranger arrived to discourse on the same enthralling subjects. “To-night,” she whispered desperately, not