In vain did she torture her mind to find a way out of the difficulties that obstructed her. Sometimes she was tempted to confess everything――she knew that he suspected the worst. He was so generous that he would forgive her mother, and the story would never become public. Everything would be arranged between them. But the secret was not her own. She had promised her mother to be silent, and she could not endure to admit the fault of a mother who had loved her so dearly, and who had sinned only out of love for her. It was at the same time intolerable to her to know that Jack suspected the truth, and to be unable to speak in extenuation of her mother's conduct. Moreover, she felt that some of her mother's guilt adhered to her. She was so far a participator in the wrong done that she profited by it. To what extent her expenses at Bath were defrayed by her father, and to what extent they were paid for out of Captain Rattenbury's savings, she did not know, but she could not free herself from the consciousness that some of this stolen money had been expended on herself. The hopelessness of their love weighed on both their hearts. Love was sweet, and yet was bitter, like the little book which the prophet ate. Of the two Winefred was the more unhappy, for she did not possess the sanguine temperament of Jack. She felt an unutterable joy at having his love, and yet it was a joy that turned to despair. How was this to end? This was what they asked each other and themselves, and never received an answer. 'It shall end for a while, now,' said Winefred, 'for to-morrow I return to Bath.' 'How is this? I thought you would not go back till your father came to fetch you away.' 'That was my first intention. But I have been obliged to give way. Things are not ripe for that yet. I take the choughs with me. I shall see my father again.' 'And how long will you be away?' 'That I cannot tell.' 'Winefred,' said Jack, 'we are at the gate of thorns. If you will set your hands along with me to unweave them and pluck them out, we shall make an opening in time. Never mind your fingers. We shall get the gap large enough in time for both of us to pass through to freedom.' CHAPTER XLV HOLWOOD OR MARLEY? 'My dear Sylvana, I wish you particularly to look at this tureen. Very handsome, is it not?' 'Beautiful, but surely very costly.' 'It is costly, my dear, as it is plated, but not so costly as it would be were it silver. Happily, at a dinner party the guests cannot examine it for the plate mark, as they can forks and spoons. In our position we must possess a handsome soup-tureen.' 'We have done without one of metal hitherto. Why buy one now?' 'Sylvana,' said Mrs. Tomkin-Jones, 'I have engaged a butler. With him we must have a suitable tureen.' 'Why, mother?' 'Because, my dear, we shall be constrained to give dinner-parties.' 'We have given nothing above high teas hitherto.' 'But with a butler, dear.' 'Well, with that adjunct?'