WITH Margaret things had reached a crisis long before that culminating moment of remorseful emotion in Allestree’s studio; at last the realities of life--as they appear separated from its pleasures and its follies--were forced upon her. Too young at the time of her marriage to comprehend its full significance, as a mere act of barter and exchange, she had never seriously anticipated her position as White’s wife; it had been shrouded in a nebulous haze of gratified vanity, of pleasures and indulgences, for she was glad to shirk the thought of it. Her awakening, therefore, had been accompanied with a shock of horror and disgust. White had been kind to her at first; even the most common and violent of brute creatures is often kind to its chosen mate, and he was proud of her beauty, determined to get the value of his money out of her social distinction; but her capricious temper, her bitter tongue and her indifference soon had their natural effect. His kindness wore itself out and when angry he could be tolerably brutal, for his temper, at best, was coarse and exacting. She had come at last to look upon the beautiful house, the lavish display, the sumptuous living as so much gilded misery, and, possessing no talisman to give her contentment, her stormy nature spent itself in rebellion and in a growing regret for her own folly. She saw, at last, in Fox all the qualities which she most admired; her mind answered his with a subtilty, a kindred sympathy which seemed to assure her of his love, to justify her assumption that his feeling had never changed. In her eager pursuit of happiness she had thought to purchase it first with beauty, then with money and now with love--the beggar’s price! It was the absorbing impulse of her being; religion she had none, except the religion of self-indulgence. Standing on the brink of disaster she still demanded happiness; it was her creed, her gospel, her divine right. The temptation of it, too, pursued her; how easy to obtain a divorce from Wicklow, a word almost and it was done! It was true that there would be a great scandal but, after all, the scandal could only add a zest to her social success; she was young, beautiful, distinguished, and if she broke the shackles that bound her could she not begin all over again? Intoxicating dream,--how full of temptation it was, of alluring sweetness! After all, does not the devil appear to us in the shape of an angel of light? What were ethics compared with her inalienable right to be happy? The thought of it made her draw a keen breath of relief. Free!--She alone knew the value of that word.