She knew now what the end would be. She thought of George Waring, and Stephen Philpotts, and of her life, cheated. She hadn’t chosen Oscar, she hadn’t really wanted him; but now he had forced himself on her she couldn’t afford to let him go. Since George died no man had loved her, no other man ever would. And she was sorry for him when she thought of him going from her, beaten and ashamed. She was certain, before he was, of the end. Only she didn’t know when and where and how it would come. That was what Oscar knew. It came at the close of one of their evenings when they had dined in a private sitting-room. He said he couldn’t stand the heat and noise of the public restaurant. She went before him, up a steep, red-carpeted stair to a white door on the second landing. From time to time they repeated the furtive, hidden adventure. Sometimes she met him in the room above Schnebler’s. Sometimes, when her maid was out, she received him at her house in Maida Vale. But that was dangerous, not to be risked too often. Oscar declared himself unspeakably happy. Harriott was not quite sure. This was love, the thing she had never had, that she had dreamed of, hungered and thirsted for; but now she had it she was not satisfied. Always she looked for something just beyond it, some mystic, heavenly rapture, always beginning to come, that never came. There was something about Oscar that repelled her. But because she had taken him for her lover, she couldn’t bring herself to admit that it was a certain coarseness. She looked another way and pretended it wasn’t there. To justify herself, she fixed her mind on his good qualities, his generosity, his strength, the way he had built up his engineering business. She made him take her over his works and show her his great dynamos. She made him lend her the books he read. But always, when she tried to talk to him, he let her see that _that_ wasn’t what she was there for. “My dear girl, we haven’t time,” he said. “It’s waste of our priceless moments.” She persisted. “There’s something wrong about it all if we can’t talk to each other.” He was irritated. “Women never seem to consider that a man can get all the talk he wants from other men. What’s wrong is our meeting in this unsatisfactory way. We ought to live together. It’s the only sane thing. I would, only I don’t want to break up Muriel’s home and make her miserable.” “I thought you said she wouldn’t care.” “My dear, she cares for her home and her position and the children. You forget the children.” Yes. She had forgotten the children. She had forgotten Muriel. She had left off thinking of Oscar as a man with a wife and children and a home. He had a plan. His mother-in-law was coming to stay with Muriel in October and he would get away. He would go to Paris, and Harriott should come to him there. He could say he went on business. No need to lie about it; he _had_ business in Paris.