And then she went, all unconscious, to her little table, and sat down, and took her work. She did not work very much, her hands being full of things more important--the affairs of the parish and estate; but to her, as to most other women, it was a welcome occasional refuge. It was true, quite true, that she was anxious about Edgar’s wife, and ready to believe in the attractions of Gussy Thornleigh, or any one else who came in his way; but other feelings confused her mind at the same time. When Edgar went away of course Arthur must go also; and Arthur had managed to twine himself up with her life in the strangest subtle way. How should she bear the blank when they were gone? It would be like the time before Edgar’s return--the silent days when she was alone in Arden. But these days had not been quickened by any new touch of life as the present time had been; and it made her shudder to think how such grey days would look when they came back. “This is fatal news to me,” said Arthur, softly sitting down opposite to her. “I thought I might have stayed here at Arden, and for once kept out of the racket of town.” “I thought you liked town,” said Clare, “and I thought my brother hated it. I must have been mistaken in both.” “Do not be so hard upon me. I have liked town more than I ought. When there are a good many things in a man’s life that he is very glad to forget, and not many that are much pleasure to think of, town is a resource to him; but when there comes a balmy time like this, when it almost looks as if the gates of heaven might open once in a way----” “You are very poetical,” said Clare, forcing herself to smile, though her heart began to flutter and beat with the sense of something more to come. “Am I?” he said, and then began to mutter between his teeth, the first line faintly, the second more audible-- “If Maud were all that she seemed, And her smile were all that I deemed, Then this world were not so bitter But a smile might make it sweet.”