He rose, came forward and bent over her chair. “Will you come back with me, Yvonne?” She would have given worlds to be away; to have, at least, a few hours to consider her answer. He expected it at once. Feminine instinct desperately sought evasion. “I shall be of no use to you. I can’t sing any more. Listen.” She turned sideways in her chair, and drawing back her head far from him, began, with a smile, the “Aria” of the Angel in the Elijah. The grave man drew himself up, shocked to the heart. He had not realised what the loss of her voice meant. Instead of the pure dove-notes that had stirred the passion of his manhood, nothing came from her lips but toneless, wheezing sounds. She stopped, bravely tried to laugh, but the laugh was choked in a sob and she burst into tears. “Come back with me, my darling,” he said, bending down again. “I will love you all the more tenderly.” Yvonne dried her eyes in her impulsive way. “I am foolish,” she said. “Crying can’t mend it.” “I will devote the rest of my life to making compensation,” said the Bishop. “Come, Yvonne.” “Oh, give me time to answer you, Everard,” she cried, driven to bay at last. “It is all so strange and sudden.” He left her side, with a kind of sigh, and resumed his former seat. He was somewhat disappointed. He had not contemplated the chance of her refusal. A glance, however, round the shabby, low-ceilinged room reassured him. The coarse, not immaculate tablecloth, the homely crockery, the half-emptied potted-meat tins on the table, the threadbare hearthrug at his feet--all spoke, if not of poverty, at least of very narrow means. She could not surely hesitate. But she did. “Take your time--of course,” he said, crossing his gaitered legs. There was a short silence. At last she said, with a little quiver of the lip:-- “I promised you, I know. But things have altered so since then. I thought I should always be free. But now I am not, you see.” “What do you mean?” he cried, startled. “It is Stephen,” Yvonne explained. “He saved me from starvation, gave me all he had, to make me well again, and has been staying all this time to support me. You don’t know how nobly he has behaved to me--yes, nobly, Everard, there is no other word for it. He has rights over me that a brother or father would have--I could not leave him without his consent. It would be cruel and ungrateful. Don’t you see that it would be wicked of me, Everard,” she added earnestly. His face clouded over. Pride rose in revolt. He crushed it down, however, and suffered the humiliation. “It would lift a responsibility from his shoulders,” he said. “I myself am willing to take him by the hand again, and help him to rise from his present position.” “You will let bygones be bygones--quite?” “With all my heart,” replied Everard. “He suffers dreadfully still,” said Yvonne. “I will do my best to heal the wound,” replied the Bishop. “I own I have judged him too harshly already.”