The sudden realisation that this was perhaps the last of the brotherly meals he should have with her, dismayed him. In a few days he would be either the acknowledged betrothed or the acknowledged husband of another woman--her bitterest enemy. The old dear order had changed. Hitherto he had held a unique and delicate position in her thoughts, that of the loyal friend and honourable lover. Henceforward he would be another woman’s husband, which would make an immeasurable difference. He looked round the familiar walls of the cosy dining-room, and then with unconscious wistfulness upon her face in profile. To him there was none more beautiful in all the world. The broad forehead; the delicate, sensitive nose; the strong, pointed chin; the mobile, faintly coloured lips; the eyes capable of great passion, yet showing habitually a grave and luminous kindness; the noble up sweep of her hair from the temple contours, giving an impression of queenliness; the soft, fair gold of her hair itself, crowning her head too lightly to be a crown and too individually to be a halo; the head poised with tender dignity upon a broad, full throat--all the conflicting features combined harmoniously together to form in a lover’s eyes a face telling of a great and tender womanhood. And the picture of that other rose before him, beautiful, too, in its sensuous duskiness, yet stamped forever with his own condemnation of commonness. His glance grew troubled as it met Irene’s. “There is nothing in the wide world that we would not do for you, Hugh,” she said. “Doing is one thing,” he replied. “Letting things go on is another, I’m afraid you’ll come to look upon me as a blackguard, and that must make some difference.” “Nothing will make any difference in our love for you. So long as Gerard and I sit opposite here, there will be your place always between us. Besides, the idea of your being a blackguard is simply silly!” He laughed in spite of his depression. Her tone was emphatic. “I believe you’d champion me through a grand jury list of iniquities. I wish you could have split yourself into two in the years past, Renie. You would have kept me out of mischief.” It was Irene’s turn to look troubled. “Do you know, Hugh,” she said in a low voice, “that lately I have feared I may have spoiled your life.” “Ah, my dear child,” he cried, regaining in a flash all his old vehemence, “it is not the missing of the angel’s touch that spoils a man’s life. He is singularly fortunate to come within the beat of her wings.” “Thank you,” she said, blushing very prettily. “That is like your old, extravagant self.” For a long time afterwards the colour remained in her face. Thousands of women have been called angels, and have thought little of it. But not one has felt otherwise than tremulously abashed when the similitude has come from a man’s worshipping sincerity. But that was the end of the conversation. Irene had said her say, and no more was to be gained by dwelling on the topic.