“Well--is there? To be so savage with you she must be pretty well determined to have him back. How the devil are you going to stop it?” “I can’t. But _you_--oh, Fred, you must!”--Her eyes clung imploringly to his troubled face. “But I don’t know anything definite! If there _is_ anything--anything one can really take hold of--you’ll have to tell me. I’ll do all I can; but if I interfere without good reason, I know it will only make Anne more determined. Have you forgotten what the Clephanes are like?” She had lowered her head again, and sat desolately staring at the floor. With the little wood-fire playing on the hearth, and this honest kindly man looking down at her, how safe and homelike the room seemed! Yet her real self was not in it at all, but blown about on a lonely wind of anguish, outside in the night. And so it would always be, she supposed. “Won’t you tell me exactly what there is against him?” she heard Landers repeat. The answer choked in her throat. Finally she brought out: “Oh, I don’t know ... women ... the usual thing.... He’s light....” “But is it all just hearsay? Or have you proof--proof of any one particular rotten thing?” “Isn’t his giving up and going away sufficient proof?” “Not if he comes back now when she sends for him.” The words shot through her like a stab. “Oh, but she mustn’t--she can’t!” “You’re fairly sure he will come if she does?” Kate Clephane put up her hands and pressed them against her ears. She could not bear to hear another question. What had been the use of coming to Fred Landers? He had no help to give her, and his insight had only served to crystallize her hazy terrors. She rose slowly from her armchair and held out her hand with a struggling smile. “You’re right. I suppose there’s nothing more to do.” “But you’re not going?” “Yes; I’m tired. And I want to be by myself--to think. I must decide about my own future.” “Your own future? Oh, nonsense! Let all this blow over. Wait till Anne comes back. The chief thing, of course, is that you should stay with her, whatever happens.” She put her hand in his. “Goodbye, Fred. And thank you.” “I’ll do all I can, you know,” he said, as he followed her down the stairs. “But you mustn’t desert Anne.” The taxi he had called carried her back to her desolate house. XVIII. Her place was beside Anne--that was all she had got out of Fred Landers. And in that respect she was by no means convinced that her instinct was not surer than his, that she was not right in agreeing with her daughter that their experiment had been a failure. Yet, even if it had, she could not leave Anne now; not till she had made sure there was no further danger from Chris. Ah--if she were once certain of that, it would perhaps be easiest and simplest to go! But not till then.