And then there came to Clytie a great calm, a new, strange happiness, in the midst of the life she had thought to be broken. She would sit by herself and think, with a smile playing round the corners of her lips, and a light in her eyes. Again the order of things seemed changed. Again a newer life, with newer hopes and responsibilities, lay before her. For the time her art, her needs, were forgotten. Trifling, dainty occupations absorbed her as she sat in the solitude of the studio on the chilly autumn days, her feet luxuriously buried in the bearskin before the great fire. Sometimes Mrs. Farquharson would come and help her, with a yearning hunger in her eyes that Clytie knew the meaning of; for Caroline was a childless woman. And then Clytie would kiss her silently and Caroline would shake her head and laugh, and talk in her bright way of the wonder that would be. Only at times did a wave of bitterness pass over her. If all that had happened in her married life since the train had carried her out of Bordighera station had been different! If only she could see her husband as she saw him that day, by the ruined tower, when she passed her hand over his hair and thought him all that could suffice a woman's needs! Sometimes she looked at him now, furtively, when his face was in repose. He seemed the same, handsome, brave, ideally perfect in manhood. Why had not the glamour lasted? Why should the “dream be better than the drink”? And then she would turn away and the thought would rise: “Why did I not continue blind? Would to God this knowledge of him had never come!” He grew a little kinder to her, however. It was a rough, patronising tenderness, it is true, but yet Clytie felt grateful. A little act of forethought and consideration softened her towards him much more than it warranted. Perhaps in spite of all he might have won her to him again, and brought her lips to his in a kiss of rare meaning--for at certain times there are wondrous tendernesses and wondrous powers of forgiveness in woman. But Thornton lost the golden chance, being busy with his muck-rake. He came home one afternoon, in an evil humour. Clytie, prepared to welcome him, looked up kindly from her lounge-chair as he came into the studio, but as she saw the blackness of his face, her heart sank. A footstool came in his way, and he sent it, with a kick, sliding along the polished floor. “Why do you litter up the place with these infernal traps, Clytie?” he asked crossly as he came up to the fire to warm his hands. Clytie, like a wise woman, held her peace. Silence is a very good friend sometimes. But as he remained there moodily, without saying a word, and the silence was growing uncomfortable, she asked him what was amiss. “Everything's amiss!” he replied roughly--“all through your silly folly. Read that!” He drew a letter from his pocket book and threw it into her lap. It ran: Dear Hernshawe: