"He took her by storm, poor child! But, after all, I believe she always preferred him to poor Allan." * * * * * There seemed nothing wanting now to Mrs. Wornock's happiness. Her son had returned, not to restlessness and impatience, not to weary again of his beautiful home, but to settle down soberly with a wife he adored. His mother was to live with him always. The Manor House was still to be her home, the music-room her room, the organ hers. In all things she was to be as she had been--plus the son she loved, and the daughter-in-law she would have chosen for herself from all the daughters of earth. "If it were not that I am sorry for Allan, there would not be a cloud in my sky," she told her son, on the second night after his return, when he had quieted down a little from that fever of triumphant gladness which had possessed him after his conquest of Suzette. "Dear mother, there is no use in being sorry for Allan. We could not both be winners. To be sorry for him is to grudge me my delight; and I could easily come to believe that you are fonder of Allan than of me." "Geoffrey!" "Well, I'll never say so again if you'll only leave off lamenting about Allan. He will have all the world before him when he comes back to England. Somewhere, no doubt there are love and sympathy, and beauty and youth waiting for him. When he knows that Suzette has made her choice, he will accept the inevitable, and fall in love with somebody else--not at Matcham." There was the faintest touch of irritation in his reply. That incessant reference to Allan began to jar upon his nerves. Wherever he went, he had to answer the same questions--to explain how he wanted to come home and Allan wanted to go further away; and how for that reason only they had parted. He began to feel like Cain, and to sympathize with the first murderer. But the worst was still to come. In the midst of a sonata of De Beriot's--long, brilliant, difficult--a _tour de force_ for Suzette, whose fingers had not grappled with such music within the last two years, the door of the music-room was opened, and Lady Emily Carew was announced, just as upon that grey afternoon a month ago. "Forgive me for descending upon you again in this way," she said hurriedly to Mrs. Wornock, who came from her seat by the window to receive the uninvited guest. "I couldn't rest after I received Miss Vincent's letter." Nothing could have been colder than the "Miss Vincent," except the stately recognition of Suzette with which it was accompanied. "Mr. Wornock"--turning to Geoffrey, without even noticing his mother's outstretched hand--"why did you leave my son?" "I thought Suzette had told you why we parted. He wished to go on. I wanted to come home. Is there anything extraordinary in that?"