After that last scene with Fritz she felt as if he were no longer her husband, as if he were only a man who had fled from her in fear. She did not think any more of his rights, her duties. He had abandoned his rights. What duties could she have towards a man who was frightened when he looked at her? And indeed all the social and moral questions to which the average woman of the world pays--because she must pay--attention had suddenly ceased to exist for Lady Holme. She was no longer a woman of the world. All worldly matters had sunk down beneath her feet with her lost beauty. She had wanted to be free. Well, now she was surely free. Who would care what she did in the future? Robin said he was there. She thought that, unless she could feel that in world there was one man who wanted to take care of her, she must destroy herself. The thought grew in her as she sat there, till she said to herself, “If it is true what he says, perhaps I shall be able to live. If it is not true--” She looked over the stone balustrade at the grey waters of the lake. Twilight was darkening over them. Late that evening, when she was sitting in the big drawing-room staring at the floor, the butler came in with a telegram. She opened it and read: “Sir Donald has told me you are at Casa Felice; arrive to-morrow from Rome--ROBIN.” “No answer,” she said. So he was coming--to-morrow. The awful sense of desolation lifted slightly from her. A human being was travelling to her, was wanting to see her. To see her! She shuddered. Then fiercely she asked herself why she was afraid. She would not be afraid. She would trust in Robin. He was unlike other men. There had always been in him something that set him apart, a strangeness, a romance, a love of hidden things, a subtlety. If only he would still care for her, still feel towards her as he had felt, she could face the future, she thought. They might be apart. That did not matter. She had no thought of a close connection, of frequent intercourse even. She only wanted desperately, frantically, to know that someone who had loved her could love her still in spite of what had happened. If she could retain one deep affection she felt that she could live. The morrow would convince her. That night she did not sleep. She lay in bed and heard the water falling in the gorge, and when the dawn began to break she did a thing she had not done for a long time. She got out of bed, knelt down and prayed--prayed to Him who had dealt terribly with her that He would be merciful when Robin came.