"My dear Philippa," he said, "I hate myself for what I have to say--it makes me detest even the sound of my own voice. Yet you are right--there is nothing for us but perfect frankness; anything else would be foolish. Neither your mother nor mine had any right to try to bind us. Such things never answer, never prosper. I cannot myself imagine how they, usually so sensible, came in this instance to disregard all dictates of common sense. I have always looked upon the arrangement as mere nonsense; and I hope you have done the same. You are free as air--and so am I." She made no answer, but, after a few minutes, when she had regained her self-possession, she said: "The sun is warm on the water--I think we had better return;" and, as they went back, she spoke to him carelessly about the new rage for garden-parties. "Does she care or not?" thought Lord Arleigh to himself. "Is she pleased or not? I cannot tell; the ways of women are inscrutable. Yet a strange idea haunts me--an uncomfortable suspicion." As he watched her, there seemed to him no trace of anything but light-hearted mirth and happiness about her. She laughed and talked; she was the center of attraction, the life of the _fête_. When he spoke to her, she had a careless jest, a laughing word for him; yet he could not divest himself of the idea that there was something behind all this. Was it his fancy, or did the dark eyes wear every now and then an expression of anguish? Was it his fancy, or did it really happen that when she believed herself unobserved, the light died out of her face? He was uncomfortable, without knowing why--haunted by a vague, miserable suspicion he could not explain, by a presentiment he could not understand--compelled against his will to watch her, yet unable to detect anything in her words and manner that justified his doing so. It had been arranged that after the _fête_ he should return to Verdun House with Lady Peters and Philippa. He had half promised to dine and spend the evening there, but now he wondered if that arrangement would be agreeable to Philippa. He felt that some degree of restraint had arisen between them. He was thinking what excuse he could frame, when Philippa sent for him. He looked into the fresh young face; there was no cloud on it. "Norman," she said, "I find that Lady Peters has asked Miss Byrton to join us at dinner--will you come now? It has been a charming day, but I must own that the warmth of the sun has tired me." Her tone of voice was so calm, so unruffled, he could have laughed at himself for his suspicions, his fears. "I am quite ready," he replied. "If you would like the carriage ordered, we will go at once."