Eleanor realises how the shock of Philip's order has been the death-blow to her good resolves. A sudden hatred of her husband leaps into her heart and brain, choking her. "A little confidence, a little love," she murmurs. "They are small things to ask at Philip's hands, yet he holds them from me in his cold reserve and suspicious dread." Her eyes are dry and bright, her throat is parched, her forehead burns. What will Carol think? Carol will be sorry, but not angry; Carol is always kind, considerate, forgiving. The dangerous fascination of imagination steals over her. Carol is at her side in a waking dream, but the scene is very different to the one she had contemplated. She fancies he is kneeling as once before by the same sofa, murmuring again those wild, impassioned words. She bends to grasp his hands and raise him from the grovelling adoration to her own level. They are just a man and woman--soul to soul, clay; ah! yes, of the earth earthly. She breaks into a low laugh which ripples round the room, and seems to die away in something like a sob. What is this rising tumult in her heart? She cannot analyse her mood, it seems as if a certain knowledge has broken in like a flood of light upon her dim reason. "Who can prevent me loving him, who can hold me back if I will it, if I choose?" The door re-opens. Sarah enters with one of Mrs. Mounteagle's little scented notes upon a salver. DEAREST ELEANOR,--If you are in, just toddle round to tea like a darling. I have some delicious toasted buns, and I want you to come and eat them. Don't put on gloves. Your all impatient, GIDDY. It is intolerable sitting in alone, fuming over her wrongs and acting a drama with her imagination. Philip detests Giddy. She will pay him out and go. Glad of anything to divert the current of her thoughts, she snatches up a small fur cap in the hall, which rests becomingly on Eleanor's wealth of waving hair. Flinging a long red cloak around her, she slips out of the house, and rings at the widow's door. "I hope she is alone. I don't feel in the mood to compass Bertie's inane conversation," thinks Mrs. Roche as the flaxen maid shows her in. The twilight has gathered, but there is no lamp, as Giddy rustles forward in a lavender tea-gown to greet Eleanor. "You are a very bad child," she says holding up her finger, "but we've found you out, and shown you up most shockingly. What right have you to break hearts, as if they were only _bric-a-brac_, and say 'Not at home' when you were probably gourmandising over the huge Buzzard cake we ordered in town?" Eleanor cannot speak, for Carol Quinton rises, and looks reproachfully into her eyes. She feels like a hunted stag, and yet she is glad--relieved. "There! now you are in a hole," continues Giddy, laughing, "with no time to invent a plausible excuse. But come and sit down and ask forgiveness. I dare say Carol will get over it."