Thus it was that Edgar left the house so early, ill at ease. His sister thought that probably the effect of her constraint and withdrawal of sympathy would be that, tracing her changed demeanour to its right cause, he would hasten to read the packet she had given him. But Edgar never thought of the packet. It did not occur to him that a parcel of old letters could have anything to do with this most present and painful estrangement. While he went out, poor fellow, with his heart full of pain, Clare looked at him from the window with anger and astonishment. What did he care? Perhaps he had known it all along--perhaps he was a conscious---- But no, no. Not till the last moment--not till evidence was before her which she could not resist--would she believe that. So the carriage came round, and she was driven to church in solitary state--sometimes excusing, sometimes condemning herself. It was a thing which happened so rarely that the village folks were in a state of commotion. Miss Arden was ill, they thought--nothing else could explain it; and so thought the kind old Rector and even Dr. Somers, who knew, or thought he knew, better than any of the others. As for Arthur Arden, who had gone to church with the hope of being invited by Edgar to accompany him home, he was in despair. Edgar, for his part, walked down very gloomily through the village to ask for Jeanie, and had his news confirmed that she had spent a tolerably good night. “But in a dead faint all the time,” said Mrs. Hesketh, who had taken the place of nurse. “She breathes, poor dear, and her heart it do beat. But she don’t know none of us, nor open her eyes. It’s awful to see one as is living, and yet dead. T’ou’d dame, she never leaves her, not since she was a-talking to you, sir, last night.”