Nobody in London needed her--nobody here needed her. If you accepted the Beaminster doctrine, then no wife would demand more from a husband than Roddy gave Rachel--but was this not simply another proof that Rachel had made a Beaminster marriage? Rachel had been flung straight from the schoolroom into marriage and the sensitive agonizing cry of a child to be loved by somebody--the cry that had always been so urgent in her--was urgent still. It was exactly this comfortable sense of being a help that Roddy had not given her. Now this letter gave it to her. But if this letter was an appeal, just as the mongrel Jacob, now at her feet, was an appeal, on the part of someone wounded and outcast, to her pity, so also was it an invitation to rebellion. It was also a temptation to deceit and, did she answer the letter, she encouraged Breton to write again; she opened up not only a new relationship to him, but also a new relationship to all the forces that were most hostile to Roddy and her married happiness. May Eversley had once said to her: "Sit down and see, without any exaggeration or false colouring, what you've got. Take away, ruthlessly, anything that you imagine that you've got but haven't. Take away ruthlessly everything that you imagine that you would like to have but are not confident of securing--See what's happened to you in the past--Take away ruthlessly any sentimental repentances or sloppy regrets, but learn quite resolutely from your ugly mistakes." Long ago she had written this down--now was the first necessity for applying it. The doctrine of Truth--Truth to Oneself, the one thing that mattered. She knew that the pursuit of Truth was to her, and to every rebel against the Beaminsters, the restive Tiger. In marrying Roddy she had been untrue to herself. In writing to Breton she would be true to herself but untrue to Roddy. She was fond of Roddy although she did not love him, nor did he, really, love her. The anxiety on both their parts to avoid hurting one another was proof enough of that, she thought. There then was the whole situation. As she felt Jacob's warm head against her foot a great agitation of loneliness and dismay and helplessness swept over her. Tears were in her throat and eyes--Then with a strong disdain she pushed it all from her. She was growing morbid, losing her sense of humour and proportion. Here in the house there was Nita Raseley staying; in the country there were people to be called upon, to be invited, to be interested in, there was Roddy, a perfect husband. She strangled that other Rachel, there in her room. "Now you're dead," she felt, and seemed to fling a lifeless, crumpled figure out into the snow-- She looked at herself in the glass. "You're not Rachel Beaminster now--you're Rachel Seddon. Act accordingly and don't whine--" She washed her face and brushed her hair, and combed Jacob's hair out of his eyes, and then, determined to be sensible and cheerful and civilized, went down to tea. II