As I finished dressing, Barbara tapped at my door and came in with Eric’s letter in her hand. “If you want this, I must give it you back,” she began. Her voice had almost left her; and the radiant vitality of an hour before had flown. “I hope you won’t have to quote it, because these things are so terribly vulgarized in court. Do I . . . have to be unfaithful? I wasn’t . . . with Eric,” she added carelessly. “I know you weren’t.” “I meant to be, . . . if I must use that . . . unclean word. For one moment I had a vision of perfect happiness, I forgot everything else. . . . It would be generous of you to say you won’t use this. Eric’s dead. And people would think he was to blame.” “I certainly shan’t use it. Barbara, why are you talking like this?” Before she could answer, the letter had to be thrust into safety. Then, with one hand clutching it to her breast, as though Eric’s heart were beating against hers, she looked up and forced her mind on to my question: “Because father’s coming down to-morrow, and we must decide what we’re going to do. We had to fight him pretty hard to get married, but we shall have to fight much harder to get divorced.” “But no one has mentioned divorce.” “_I_ have. You said you could never forget that letter. . . . It was a great risk for us to marry; but you were so sweet and I was so miserable. . . . I see now that the thing never had a fair chance while Eric was alive. I heard his voice in the streets, wherever we’d been together, when I knew he was the other side of the world; and, as soon as I had a chance, I rushed to him. When he wouldn’t have anything to do with me, I _did_ try once more to make a success of our life. You wished for a son; and I did my best, though Eric was the only man I wanted as father of my children. Perhaps that’s why I . . . couldn’t keep him alive, poor mite. . . . It’s funny that little things should cause such big troubles. If I hadn’t asked you to open my letters, we _should_ have made a success.” . . . There was a moment’s break in her terrible composure; and she turned away with a single dry sob. “Why didn’t you tell me, Babs?” “You wouldn’t have understood; you don’t understand now.” “If I hadn’t understood . . . a little, should I have come?” Unwittingly, I moved a step forward; and she held up her hand against me as though I were assaulting her: “If you’d understood, you wouldn’t have waited twelve days.” I was goaded beyond discretion by the scorn in her voice. I had understood and forgiven too little, it seemed, when I fancied that I had forgiven and understood too much. “It was . . . a startling letter,” I answered in her own measure. “Whenever you told me you’d try to forget Eric . . .” “You wondered for twelve days whether you could ever trust me again.” She did not trouble to look at me, but I felt myself flushing. “As though any other man could tear my heart out of me as Eric did! Why _did_ you come?” “Because _I_ needed _you_.”