She had travelled largely with her pupils, had learned to criticize and discriminate. Here was a woman after Ebenezer's heart, grounded in that hobby he longed to make his own. The object of his visit to the little sea-side town had been to attend a neighbouring sale where the death of the owner had thrown on the market a certain much-discussed old master. Impressed by Helen Greaves' obvious knowledge, he begged her to accompany him, and under her advice he had bought that bronze group now in his London house, somehow overlooked by the dealers at the sale. Without her encouragement he would have passed it by, misled by the absurdly low price, and even at the time he made the purchase he wondered to himself if she were not at fault. On his return, however, he showed it to a dealer, and found to his amazement that Helen's acumen had secured him an undoubted treasure. For the first time he tasted the peculiar deep joy of the bargain hunter in his hour of triumph. Then and there he made up his mind. Here was the partner his new life entailed. And the realization of all he had to offer, with the fact of her present subordinate position, swung him back again on to his old pedestal, with a returned consciousness of mastery. For the man had to reign. It was no passing weakness. Abdication meant paralysis of his powers. In cold-blooded terms, void of sentiment, he had worded a letter to Helen Greaves. No deed of partnership was ever made more clear than this formal proposal of marriage! Six months later they were man and wife, launched on a honeymoon planned to include a thorough course of study at the foreign galleries. It speaks for the character of the ex-governess that this business alliance was sealed in a church. For Ebenezer was a staunch Nonconformist and lived and died loyal to his creed. Slowly but surely in his wife's clever hands he mastered the intricaces of his new cult. He came to the fore as an ardent collector, and, to crown his success, Cydonia appeared. With the advent of her child, Helen's ambition found a new outlet. She became more social, seeking to force those doors where money, though a help, could not purchase right of admission. Here she found a new factor in her Church. Always religiously inclined, she turned to Charity--whose cloak nowadays shelters many "climbers"--poured forth money in big bazaars, and fed the clergy, who flocked to her house. Ebenezer grumbled, but bent before her will. Little by little her name appeared as patroness of the pleasure schemes devised to "help the poor." She was sought for on committees, pestered for donations, patronized herself by that upper class, which used her and smiled at her and let her drift among them. But Helen Cadell had come to stay. Slowly and quietly she strengthened her position, inconspicuous, yet ever to the fore, looking to that day when her daughter should step as though by right on this hallowed ground.