She was consumed with remorse. Ann’s statement that in his last agonies, dying with poisoned blood, he had only thought and spoken of _her_, made her heart ache, almost literally—the aching of unshed tears over the irrevocable. She had not been unfaithful to him in body; but in mind, in desire, _yes_: from the day of the marriage onwards, and never more so than from the day of her departure from Hangodi. She knew she had hoped then that somehow this departure, this desertion of John when danger was approaching—might be the beginning of her severance from him, and lead to her union with Roger. To _him_ at any time during the long _safari_ she would have surrendered herself.... Yet though her upper consciousness—the "speaking to one’s self" (which we almost do sometimes aloud, as if to an audience that may register our words and resolves)—asserted that the _only_ reparation she _could_ make was _never_ to see Roger again—(what a mercy he had behaved better than she had done!)—her innermost intention was to stay on in Unguja on some pretext or other, in the faint hope he might ... _might_ ... "do the right thing," as Ann had put it ... might marry her. If he would _only_ do that her whole remaining life should be _one long atonement_ to John. She would _never_ forget him and his unselfish love of a shallow, ungrateful woman. Mr. Callaway had hinted she might like to take the next steamer home: there was one going in a week—back to England. But how could she go back ... and face Mrs. Baines ... and live on her parents? John had probably no money to leave her; the Mission, after so short a term of married life, would certainly give her no pension ... why should it? The post of National school-teacher at Aldermaston was long ago filled up. And could she even resume her life there? At no great distance was Engledene, with Lord and Lady Silchester. Lady Silchester she vaguely dreaded as a person who might mock at her.—She must have heard something about her from Captain Brentham. What—what—_what_ was she to do? Insist on remaining out in Africa and rejoin the Mission? And work under Ann? The thought of the altered circumstances repelled her. Who would care _now_ if she were ill? She had had several illnesses and many fits of malaise—and tears of self-pity now ran down her cheeks. And how _good_ and _uncomplaining_——here choking sobs, hiccups, almost a loud wailing intervened—dear John had been. The cups of broth he had brought to her bedside, the little meals to tempt her appetite.... And Roger? ... The equal solicitude—the interest _he_ had shown, even in her whims! * * * * *