As he limped back, up the avenue, when Dymock had ridden away, he thought that perhaps it might make the rupture easier, if it took place elsewhere, and not at Omberleigh, where apparently the world and his wife--specially his wife--was busy with his affairs. The world and his wife had been so shut out from his own purview hitherto that he was wholly unprepared for the shock of surprise, amusement, interest, which his sudden marriage excited. In such a sparsely populated neighbourhood he had believed that he might do what he pleased without exciting comment. He saw now, with sudden clarity, how impossible such an existence as he had planned for his unlucky wife would have been in reality. A woman so used--any woman in the world except Virginia--would have cried her wrongs from the house-tops. His persecution of her could not have been hid for long. He felt that he was looking out upon a new world, of whose existence he had been as unaware as the proverbial ostrich. His vindictive malice even had its ridiculous side. He had made an egregious fool of himself. Heavy as lead was his heart as he entered the house. Cosmo and Damian, with their coloured ribbons about their fluffy necks, were at play in the hall, dancing about at hide and seek behind the big chairs, while Grim, his own golden collie, sat upon a settle, her feet tucked up like a fashionable lady afraid of a mouse, uttering panting, whining protests against the reckless interlopers. Gaunt called her, and she came down slowly and with quite evident nervousness from her elevation. Cosmo hunched his lovely grey fluffy back into an arch, and spat. His tail became a bottle brush. Grim slunk apologetically by, her tail between her legs. "Poor old girl," said Gaunt, as he went into the dining-room to lunch. "You and I are a bit superfluous in this house now, it seems." He went out that afternoon with the object of meeting Caunter some distance away at a house whose tenant had asked for a new thatch. For the first time in his life he forgot what he had come out for, and wandered by himself until past six o'clock, his whole mind focused upon his domestic affairs, wondering whether any readjustment were possible, and if so, how he should set about it. Entering the house once more, he suddenly remembered his neglected appointment, and told himself that he would go round to Caunter's house after dinner and apologise. Slowly and heavily he went upstairs, and into his room to change. In the midst of his toilet sounds came to him, low and muffled, from the next room. At first he hardly noticed; then he crept close to the door, and listened. What he heard gave him a curious sensation of heat, of hurry, of desperate sympathy, and extraordinary vexation.