The scattered party was suddenly strung to tensity; Morosine drew himself up, stiff as steel, but stood his ground. Here was the man he had waited for, who was necessary to him. Lady Maria, blinking her little black eyes, Melusine, with hers in a blur of mist, Gerald Scales, level and impassive, joined the other three.

Ingram, with a stretched smile, was volubly explaining. “I've been in London a week—to-day's the first glimpse of the sun I've had. I do think they might make better arrangements for a man home from Africa. I met your mother last night at a play. She told me that I might see you here.” He turned, without effrontery, to greet Melusine. “Ages since we have met. Ah, Scales, how are you?”

The tall Melusine stooped her head; Scales nodded, then, by an afterthought, shook hands. “I'm very fit, thanks,” he said. “Been travelling?”

Sanchia sought the side of Lady Maria, to whom she named Ingram. His exaggerated bow was accepted. “So you've arrived, I see,” said Lady Maria.

“One does, you know.” Ingram shrugged at the inevitable. “All roads lead to Rome.”

“Most roads lead to Lady Maria,” Morosine said to Sanchia, who replied from her heart, “I'm very glad that mine did.” Moved either by loyalty to his friendship, or touched by his recent words, she then brought him bodily into play. “Mr. Nevile Ingram; Prince Morosine.”

The two men inclined; Morosine lifted his hat, Ingram touched his brim.

Ingram, whom Morosine judged as a hard worker just now, supported his part with great gallantry. If he was naked to all these people who knew him, he appeared quite unashamed. Morosine, watching him carefully, believed that he had devoted a night's vigil to getting word perfect. He described Khartoum with vivacity—the English drill sergeant reigning over mudheaps, flies, and prowling dogs; getting up cricket-matches for the edification of contemptuous blacks. “They judge us, those fellows, you know. They are measuring us with their glazed eyes. The cud they chew has gall in it. I don't suppose anything offends them more deeply than our idiotic games. Is there a more frivolous race in the world than ours?”

Lady Maria suggested that the Boers might ask that question; Morosine that the Germans might answer it. Sanchia standing between these two, faced by Ingram, kept silent. She was conscious of being closely under observation. Morosine did not once lose sight of her. Whatever he said was addressed to her. Once, when she looked at him, she saw the gleam of knowledge in his eyes. He and Ingram never spoke to each other directly; indirectly Morosine capped whatever Ingram said. It was these two who maintained the talk through her sensitive frame.

Melusine and her husband exchanged glances—she in obedience to his fidgety heels. He had dug a hole in the gravel deep enough to bury a kitten. Her curtsey—it was almost that—to Lady Maria was very pretty. She drew in her suffering sister, almost embraced her. “Dearest, dearest!” she whispered. Sanchia, who was very pale, made no answer, and hardly returned the salute.

“Insufferable beggar,” was Gerald Scales' outburst. “I could have shot him at sight. But you women will go through with it, I suppose.”

“Oh, Gerald,” faltered Melusine, “it's dreadful—but what can she do?”

“Pon my soul, I'd take Morosov—the Polish party—what's-his-name—first. I would indeed—on the whole.”

There was nothing to say. Melusine knew that could not be.

Lady Maria, however, who never made a fuss over spilt milk, lost no time in ladling up what might be possible. She asked Ingram to luncheon, and was accepted with a cheerful, “Thanks, most happy.” It may have been malice which turned her to Morosine with the question. “And you? Will you join us?”

Morosine promptly excused himself. He had guests, and must consider them. He took ceremonious leave. “You remember, I hope, that I am to see you on Thursday, Lady Maria. And Miss Percival?” He looked to Sanchia, who did not turn him her eyes.

“Perfectly,” said her ladyship. “What's your hour?”

“We will dine at half-past eight.” He named the restaurant. He turned to pay his farewells to Sanchia. She looked him No, being unable to speak to him. Her eyes, deep lakes of woe, were crying to him. His answered.

He held out his hand and received hers. “Thursday,” he repeated, and left her with her fate.

Lady Maria, at luncheon, made what she called the best of a bad business. She treated Ingram to a brisk curiosity. “So you're a wanderer, I hear—like the Gay Cavalier of my childhood. Your mother may have heard the song. Mine sang it. I believe that that kind of thing was considered heroic in her day; in ours, heroism is more difficult, and much more dull. You might try heroism, Mr. Ingram.”

“I might, no doubt,” Ingram said. “Hitherto, I've preferred to travel. But I'm home for good now, so far as I can see.”

“We all hope so,” said Lady Maria. “But that remains to be seen.”

“Of course it does,” said Ingram blandly, and turned to Sanchia. “I thought your mother looking very well. Your father wasn't there. I saw Philippa, by the way; but I suppose she didn't remember me. That was her husband with her, I take it. Stiff old boy.” So he went on, letting bygones be bygones. It was after luncheon that her ordeal came.

Lady Maria having departed for her siesta, he came instantly to Sanchia with his hand out for her. “Sancie, I couldn't talk before all those people. You must forgive me, my dear. You are too good a sort—you must forgive me.”

He had to wait; but slowly she lifted her hand and let him take it. “I have forgiven you,” she said. He stroked her arm.

“That's nice of you—that's like you. I know that I behaved like a brute. I was awfully cut up about it afterwards—but, as you know, I had great provocation.”

“Not from me, I think.” Her eyes were upon him now.

“No, no,” he admitted; “certainly not from you; but—well, perhaps I may say that I had some ground for thinking that you—possibly—No, I don't think I ought to say that. At any rate, I thought then that I had. As for that young friend of yours—but he's nothing. It's you I want to make my peace with.”

“It's not difficult,” she said. “I tell you that I don't bear any malice. I bore none at the time. I wanted to go.”

He let her hand slide from his, and plunged his own into his pockets. “I know you did; I felt that at the time. That hurt me a good bit. I had come to rely upon you so much—oh, for every mortal thing. I expect the whole place has gone to the devil now. You had your hand on the tiller, by Jove! You kept a straight course, You see, I'd got into the way of thinking we were—married, don't you know, and all that—-”

“I think you had, indeed,” she said. He saw her wry smile.

“I know what you mean by that. You mean, if that's marriage—many thanks! Well, my dear, all I can say is, you were absolutely wrong. It was not marriage—it never had been, and you know it couldn't have been. But if it had been, Sancie, you'd have been as right as rain. You know you would. Your own place—everything to your hand—Society—all that kind of thing. Why, you'd never have thought it amiss in me to go off tiger-shooting for a bit. You'd have had your whack of travelling, playing the grass widow; you'd have entertained, had all sorts of little games—and both of us been all the better. No! But it was just because our relationship was so infernally irregular that you felt those separations—took them, if I may say it, so hard. Depend upon it, that was it.”

Her lip curled back, though she said nothing. She wondered if he had always been quite so fatuous as this, quite so sublimely unhumorous. If he had, what under heaven had she been about? That she could have believed this smug cockscomb to have loved her—to have been capable of anything but hunger and thirst for her—incredible! It made her out precisely as fatuous as he. And yet she said nothing. With the likes of him nothing seemed worth doing except to forget him.

And she was to marry him, to live in his house, to see him daily—ah, and more than that; and yet she said nothing of what her curled back lip expressed. She was in the presence of her fate, and, as ever, was dumb before it. To make him shrivel under scorn, to wind her tongue about him like a whip till he writhed; to play the honest woman and tell him quietly that she did not love and had nothing more to say to him; or to ask him urgently for release—she did none of these things: none of them entered her head. She had never shirked the apportioning of the Weaving Women. Destiny was unquestionable. She felt that she abhorred Ingram. What she was to suffer from him she knew but too well. And yet she knew also that she was going to marry him, to be neglected by him, put to scorn, betrayed. All these things she would undergo, because they could not be avoided. She was bound as well as gagged. Her destiny was before her, as her character was within. The one had begotten the other. She had sowed, and now she was to reap. Her stony mind contemplated the harvest, and saw that it was just.

Therefore she said nothing, but stood with her foot on the fender, shading her face from the fire with her thin hand. In this attitude, though able to see sideways what was coming upon her, she stood nerveless to his approach. “Sancie, my own Sancie,” he said, and put his arm about her, and drew her bodily to his side. She stiffened, but allowed it.

“Dearest girl, tell me that you forgive me—tell me that. I am wretched without you—I can't go on like this. It's not good for me; my health suffers. Darling Sancie, forgive poor old Nevile. He was once your boy—you loved him so much. For the sake of old times, Sancie, my dear.”

She could only say, “I have forgiven you—you know that. I have told you so.” He pressed her closely to him, feeling his urgent need to make the most of what she had to give him. Her apathy struck him mortally chill; he wooed her the more desperately.

Holding her to his heart—an inanimate burden—he kissed her cold lips, her eyelids, her hair; called her by names whose use she had long forgotten, whose revival caused her pain like nausea. If he could have known it, this was the last way to win her. It was like pressing upon a queasy invalid the sweets which had made him sick. But he, remembering their ancient potency, seeing himself the triumphant wielder of charms, felt secure in them still; therefore she was his darling, his hardy little lover, his Queen of Love, his saucy Sancie, his lass. On fire himself by his own blowing, at last he fell upon his knees and clasped hers: “Dearest, most beautiful, my own, I love you more than ever. Comfort me, be my salvation—I pray that I may be worth your while. Marry me, Sancie, and save my soul alive.”

Honestly, for the moment, he believed himself irresistible, and so far succeeded with her that her disgust hid itself in a cloud of pity. She felt pity for a man abject at her feet, and could speak more kindly to him.

But she could not bring herself to touch him. Looking down at him there, her eyes were softer and her lips took a gentler curve. “You mustn't be down there,” she said. “I don't like to see you there—and can't talk to you till you get up. Let's sit down and talk—if you will.” He rose obediently and stood with heaving chest, while she drew a chair to the fire and seated herself. Then he took to the hearthrug, and possessed himself of her hand.

“What a cold hand, my dear! Oh, Sancie, how I could have warmed you once! Is that never to be again? Don't tell me so, for God's sake.”

“Oh, how can I tell!” cried she. “Surely you can understand me better than that? Do you ask me to forget everything that has has happened in eight years?”

“I asked you to forgive me, my dear.”

“And I have forgiven.”

“But do you store these things up against me? That's not too generous, is it?”

“I don't store anything,” she assured him; “but it wouldn't be honest of me to pretend I am what I was—once. I was a child then, and now I'm a woman. You have made me that. I am what you made me.”

He stared into the fire, dropped her hand, which she instantly hid under the other.

“You mean to tell me, then,” he said, “that I have made you cease to care?”

She tried to soften the verdict. “You seemed to me not to care very much yourself. You left me for a year together—”

“Once, my dear. I left you for one year.”

“One whole year, you know,” she replied, “and for other times too.”

“I never ceased to love you,” he vowed. “You must be aware how much I depended upon you. You were always with me.”

She could have laughed at him. “I don't pretend to the same state of mind. During those absences of yours I learned to be happy alone—and I was happy, too.”

This seemed horrible to him. “I could not have believed it of you,” he said, aghast. “You must have changed indeed.”

“I have changed,” she owned. He started to his knees and clasped her.

“Beloved, I can change you again—I am the man who had your heart. I must do it—it's my right as well as my duty. Trust me again, my own; give me your dear hand again—and you shall see. If you are changed for the worse, I am changed for the better. You have redeemed me. What is it they say in the Bible? By your stripes I am healed. Yes, yes—that's precisely it. Kiss me, my own girl; kiss me.” His eyes implored: she stooped her sad head that he might kiss her. He strained upwards and held her until she broke away with a sob. “Oh, leave me, leave me for a little while,” she prayed him brokenly. “I can't talk any more now; I assure you I can't.”

He begged her pardon for his vehemence. “I'm pretty bad myself, you know. This kind of thing plays the deuce with a man's heart.”

She could thank him with a woman's for this naive assurance. “I don't doubt you for a moment,” she said. “You have been rather eloquent.”

“Eloquent, my dear!” He raised his eyebrows. “You might spare me congratulations upon my eloquence. I don't deserve very much, perhaps—though God knows I tried to make you comfortable; but perhaps I deserve credit for sincerity.”

She was not to be drawn that way. “I don't doubt your sincerity in the least,” she said. “But I wish you to allow for mine. I am changed, and have told you so.”

“I can see that you are. Heaven knows that. Perhaps I deserve it: I don't know. It's hardly for me to talk about my own points, is it? Criticism, from whichever side it comes, does seem to me out of place in a love-scene. And you found me eloquent in spite of it! Surely I may congratulate myself upon that.”

She looked at him standing before her, his arms folded; she showed him a face too dreary to be moved by sarcasm. “You may congratulate yourself on lots of things, I'm sure.”

Annoyance began to prick him; he showed spirit. “You are tired—and I may have tired you. I won't do that any longer. I think I'll go, if you'll excuse me to your Lady Maria. Sensible lady, that. She goes to sleep....” He took a turn over the room, then came back and stood over her. “I have not had my answer yet. I'll come for it in a few days' time. May I hope you'll have it for me—say, to-day week?”

“What is the question I have to answer?” She looked up for it, though she knew what it was to be quite well.

“Do you wish it repeated?” He was perfectly cool by now. “I'll put it categorically. I have wronged you, and wish to repair my fault: will you allow it? I love you more than before: will you permit me to prove it? I believe that I can make you happy: may I try?”

She had scarcely listened, and when she answered him, did not lift her head. “I can't answer you now, Nevile. Don't ask me.”

“I have not asked you. I have simply put my questions fairly. I will come for my answer next Sunday afternoon. Good-bye, Sanchia.”

He held out his hand and received hers, which he kissed. Then he turned and left her alone.

“I should swallow him, if I were you,” was Lady Maria's spoken reflection upon what her young friend was able to tell her. “I should swallow him like a pill. You won't taste him much, and he'll do you worlds of good. The world? I'm not talking of the world. I never do. He'll put you right with yourself. That's much more to the point. He's in love with you, I believe. From what you tell me, that's new. You suppose that he was in love with you before. I do not. He was in love with himself, as you presented him. Most men are. Now you are to occupy that exceedingly comfortable position of a woman out of love with her husband, extravagantly beloved by him. Next to being a man's mistress there's no surer ground for you than that, with respectability added, mind you. No mean addition. Take my advice, my dear, and you won't regret it.”

But Sanchia knew at the bottom of her heart that Ingram was not in love with her. He wanted her restored to his collection.