Mr. Davenport was at home most of the time. Now and then he went away for a few days, and always came back alone. There were no callers at the house, and she at first hoped she might die, and when she found her bodily health unimpaired, looked forward with a sense of relief to the time when she should go mad. Still her mental health held out as well as her bodily health, and weeks grew into months, and found no change in her or her manner of life. But there came a slight change in her home. During the first few weeks of her married life no stranger ever crossed the threshold of Kilcash House. Now a tall, gaunt, humble-mannered man, of slow, soft speech and unpretending ways, was often with Mr. Davenport for a long time in the day, sometimes far into the night, The husband never took the wife into his business confidence, and the wife had no curiosity whatever. But from odd words she gathered that this young man, whose name was Michael Fahey, depended on her husband, and was helped and received by him because of some old ties between the families of both. She heard Fahey was staying at the village of Kilcash for his health, which was delicate, and that he was completely trustworthy and well-disposed towards Mr. Davenport. All this reached Mrs. Davenport without leaving any impression whatever on her mind beyond the simplest value of the words. Her husband introduced Fahey to her as a man in whom he took a sincere interest, and whom he wished her to think well of. Whether he intended his wife should or should not treat the stranger as an equal, she did not know, she did not care. For a time she took little heed of Fahey, but gradually it dawned upon her that in him she had a new admirer. She was accustomed to admiration, surfeited with it. Her love romance was at an end. She was married to a man for whom she did not care, from whom she did not shrink, to whom she owed no ill-will, who was in his poor, narrow, selfish way good and kind to her. If she had now any commerce with laughter, she would have laughed; but even the pathetically absurd experience she had had of love could not provoke a smile, and she simply took no heed, said no word, gave no sign. She did not feel angry, flattered, amused, even bored. She was past any of these emotions now. She would, she could be no more than indifferent. Nothing could be more respectful than Fahey's manner. He did not regard her as human. He worshipped her afar off. He ate his heart in silence. He breathed no word, no sigh, gave wilfully no sign. But she saw his downcast or averted face, and she read the homage in furtive glances of his wondering eyes. Then came the scene with the rose and her husband's absence abroad, followed by his return, and a brief history of the marvellous escape he had from that French bank, and his resolution that he would now settle down in life and speculate no more. She then had but a dim idea of what speculation meant, of what his business was.