Presently she came to a rustic seat--a plank between two trees. She had walked now for more than an hour and the cool shade and the quiet spot appealed to her. She sat down and undid her veil. She would stay a moment and rest her eyes--the white mesh had been more than usually severe under the glint of the light through the foliage. Not a soul had passed her since she had entered on the bridle-path. The noise of the city was very distant--she could scarcely hear it. At intervals came the faint clang of a gong, the whistle of a locomotive, the exhaust of an automobile on an up-grade. She did not see the man who, his horse's bridle rein over his arm, rounded the turn and came slowly toward her. Her back was toward them and on the soft path the steps of the horse were almost without noise. When she did hear them and, startled, swung suddenly around, it was to come face to face with Harry Lorraine. The recognition was mutual and simultaneous. He stopped and surveyed her with scrutinizing glance--a bit of a frown furrowed between the eyes, the eyes themselves half closed. She regarded him with a look as impersonally indifferent as though he were the most casual stranger, then shifted it with interest to his horse. "So!" he said, after a moment's steady stare. "You have returned--after your paramour has cast you off. Whom do you wait for now, I wonder?" The cold insult of the words were more than she could endure. "Not you, at all events!" she retorted. He laughed mirthlessly--a hollow, mocking laugh that seemed to wrench his very soul. "No, not me," he answered--"even _your_ effrontery would hesitate at the same victim twice." She shrugged her shoulders and made no reply. He waited, while the horse drew over and began to crop the grass at her feet. At length, he spoke again. "What do you intend to do, Mrs. Lorraine--have you come back with the purpose of driving some bargain with me--a bargain that will leave you a trifling semblance of your good name?" A slight smile curled her lovely lips but she made no answer. "Because, if you have," he went on, "I warn you that it will be unavailing." The idea of his warning her of anything now, after the way he had stood back and let her drift upon the rocks, was so intensely absurd that she laughed. "_You_ would warn me!" she inflected. "Warn me!" and she laughed again. "Do you think you are capable of warning any one?" He saw her meaning and his face grew pale with anger. "You think that I might have warned you before?" he broke out. "Yes, I might----" "And you did not!" she interrupted. "Therefore you are a contemptible knave not to have saved your own wife." "I might have warned you," he repeated slowly, "if I had suspected you were in danger of forgetting your marriage vows." "Then you were a fool for not realizing it.--_You_ had plenty of warning."