And Ethel was so glad to hear the customary affection return to Rita's voice, the soft lips upon her cheek set her gentle and loving heart in so warm a glow, that her fears and objections dissolved and she said no more. The electric bell at the front door whirred. Rita tore herself from Ethel's embrace. There was a mirror over the mantel-shelf. She gazed into it for a few seconds and then hurried away into the little hall. There was the click of the latch as it was drawn back, a moment of silence, and then Ethel heard a voice with a peculiar vibration and timbre--an altogether unforgettable voice--say two words. "At last!" Then there was a murmur of conversation, the words of which she could not catch, interrupted once by Rita's happy laughter. Finally she heard Rita hurry into the bedroom, no doubt for her cloak, and return with an excited word. Then the door closed and there was an instant of footsteps upon the stone stairs outside. Ethel was left alone. She went to her bookshelf--she did not seem to want to think just now--and after a moment's hesitation took down "Sesame and Lilies." Then she sat at the table with a sigh and looked without much interest at the bananas, the sardines and the brown bread. Ethel was left alone. CHAPTER II OVER THE RUBICON "Inside the Horsel here the air is hot; Right little peace one hath for it, God wot; The scented dusty daylight burns the air, And my heart chokes me till I hear it not." --_Swinburne._ Gilbert and Rita said hardly anything to each other as the motor-cab drove them to the restaurant where they were to dine. There was a sort of constraint between them. It was not awkwardness, it was not shyness. Nevertheless, they had little to say to each other--yet. They had become extraordinarily intimate during the last weeks by means of the letters that had passed between them. In all his life Lothian had never written anything like these letters. Those already written, and those that were to be written before the end, would catch the imagination of Europe and America could they ever be published. In prose of a subtle beauty, which was at the same time virile and with the organ-note of a big, revealing mind, he had poured his thoughts upon the girl.