All that night Athena lay awake. Her brain was extraordinarily alive. She had not had so bad a bout of wakefulness for years.

If only she were free!

She lay wondering what Lingard had meant by those words—words which she had put into his mouth, and which he had uttered in the thick tones of a man who has lost control of himself, and who speaks scarce knowing what he says.

In the world in which Mrs. Maule lived when she was not at Rede Place, it was a firmly-established belief that those unhappily or unsuitably married could, by making a determined effort, strike off their fetters. And in this connection it had been gradually borne in upon her that the good old proverb which declares that where there's a will there's a way is, in the England of to-day, peculiarly true of everything that pertains to the marital relations of men and women.

The question had never before touched her nearly, and Athena as a rule only concerned herself with what did touch her nearly.

However much she chafed against the bonds which bound her to Richard Maule, the thought that she, Mrs. Maule of Rede Place, should join the crowd of ambiguous women who are neither maids, nor wives, nor widows, was unthinkable. Her day, so she often secretly reasoned with herself, would come later—after Richard's death. At the time of their marriage he had made magnificent, absurdly magnificent settlements. He could do nothing to alter that fact; so much she had been at some pains to ascertain. Meanwhile, she made the best she could of life.

But now, with a dramatic suddenness which strongly appealed to her calculating and yet undisciplined nature—an unlooked for piece of good fortune had come her way. Were she free, or within reasonable sight of freedom, the kind of life for which she now longed passionately was almost certainly within her grasp.

Lingard the man roused in Athena Maule none of that indescribable sensation, part physical, part mental, which she had at first thought, nay hoped, he would do. But that, so she told herself with unconscious cynicism, was a fortunate thing. She had now set her whole heart on being Lingard's wife,—only to secure that end would she be Lingard's lover. Her wild oats were sown. Never more would she allow herself to become the prey of passion,—that "creature of poignant thirst and exquisite hunger...."

She gave but a very fleeting thought to Lingard's engagement to Jane Oglander. Engagements are perpetually made and broken, and fortunately this particular engagement had not even been publicly announced.

No; what deeply troubled her, what stood in the way of the fruition of her desire was—Richard, the man who had so slight a hold on life, and yet who seemed so tenacious of that which had surely lost all savour.

In the darkness of the night, the pallid face of Athena's husband rose before her,—cruel, watchful, streaked, as it so often was when Richard looked her way, with contempt as well as hatred.

How amazingly Richard had altered in the ten years she had known him, and in nothing more than in the expression of his face, which she now visioned with such horrible vividness!

In old days Richard Maule had had a handsome, dreamy, placid face,—the kind of profile which looks to great advantage on a cameo or medal. Now, as Athena often told herself, it was the face of a suffering devil, and of a devil, alas! who looked as if he would never die.

But the days when she had measured anxiously the span of Richard's life were past. Athena, now, could not afford to wait for her husband's death; she must find some other way to freedom.

There was a story which had remained imprinted for two years—or was it three?—on the tablets of Mrs. Maule's memory, and this was the more strange, the more significant, because she had not come across the case in any direct way.

All she could remember of the affair—luckily she had a very good memory for such things—had been told her by a certain Mrs. Stanwood, who was noted for her extraordinary knowledge of other people's business, and for whom Athena had never had any particular liking.

But now the idle words of this casual acquaintance became tremendously significant, pregnant with vital issues.

She sat up in the darkness and pressed her hands against her face in her effort to recapture every word of what had been at the time so unimportant a piece of gossip.

The story had been told her at Ranelagh. She could still see the low-ceilinged entrance hall where the eagerly whispered words had been uttered.

They were standing together, Athena and Maud Stanwood, waiting for the rest of their party, when there had swept by them a pretty, well-dressed, tired-looking woman. Suddenly, a man had come forward and the two for a moment met face to face. Then, with a muttered word of apology, the man passed on.

Mrs. Stanwood clutched Athena's arm. "Do look at them!" she whispered. "How very dramatic! I wonder if this is the first time they have met since the case!" And Athena obediently stared at the pretty, tired-looking woman; the man had disappeared.

"Who is she? Who are they? What case do you mean?" she asked.

And the other answered provokingly, "Surely you remember all about it?"

"But I don't remember. Please tell me? Was it a divorce case?" Athena spoke a little pettishly.

"Divorce? Oh, no! Something quite different. Why, if she had been divorced she would not be here. No, no; their marriage was annulled. The case made quite a talk because they had been married so long—I believe fourteen years. I was at the wedding. She was such a pretty bride. Of course she married again—the other man. But it's rather bad taste of her to come here now, for she used to be here a good deal with him—I mean with her first husband."

Athena, amused with the tale, had pressed the other to tell her all about it, and Mrs. Stanwood, nothing loth, had proceeded to do so, quoting similar cases, and intimating, with the shrewdness which always distinguished her, how odd it was that more childless women didn't have recourse to so easy, so reputable a way of ridding themselves of dull and undesirable husbands!

A sensation of intense relief, nay more, of triumphant satisfaction, stole into Athena's heart. What that woman, that nervous, pretty, faded-looking woman, had done after fourteen years of marriage, Athena could certainly do now. No one looking at Richard—at that poor, miserable wreck of a man—could doubt that Mrs. Maule had a right to her freedom.

"If only you were free!" She was not quite sure in what sense Lingard had uttered those memorable words, but it was enough for her that he could, if necessary, be reminded of having said them. Once she were indeed free, Lingard, so Athena felt comfortably sure, would not need to be so reminded.

Nature, so unkind to woman, has given her one great advantage over man. She can, while herself remaining calm, rouse in him a whirlwind of tempestuous emotion.

Many a time in the last few years Mrs. Maule had heard the cry, "If only you were free!" but, while listening with downcast eyes to the hopeless wish, she had known well that the speaker did not really mean what he said, or if he meant it—poor Bayworth Kaye had meant it—then he was, like Bayworth, ineligible, or if eligible as a lover, absurdly ineligible as a husband.

Her acute, subtle mind, trained from childhood only to concentrate itself on those problems which affected, or might affect, herself, turned to the lesser problem of Jane Oglander.

Jane Oglander was an obstacle. Far less an one than Richard, but still likely to be a formidable obstacle owing to Lingard's strained sense of honour.

So much must be frankly admitted. But it would be a mistake to make too much of Jane. Once Jane realised how unsuited she was to become Hew Lingard's wife, she would draw back—of that Athena felt assured.

But how could Jane be brought to understand? Would Lingard himself ever allow her to see the truth, or would the task fall to her—to Athena?

If what the world now thought were true, Hew Lingard might hope to rise to almost any eminence in the delightful, the glorious career of arms. But for that, and again Athena was quite sincere with herself, he would need to have by his side a clever and brilliant woman, without whose help he might find himself shelved as many another man of action has been. It was this fact that someone ought to convey to poor Jane Oglander.

Within the last few months, by merely saying a word to a distinguished personage at the War Office, Mrs. Maule had been able, so she quite believed, to advance Bayworth Kaye materially—to procure him, that is, a post on which he had set his heart, and for which he was eminently fitted.

The official in question had been extremely cautious, not to say cold, during their little conversation, but a week or two later Athena had been gratified to receive from the great man a pretty little note in which he had informed her that her protÉgÉ—as he called poor Bayworth—was going, after all, to be given the post for which he was so admirably qualified.

Athena had no reason to under-estimate her powers. The average man always, and the exceptional man generally, capitulated at once. Even politicians were indulgent to her ignorance, nay more, amused by her lack of knowledge of British public affairs. But Athena was now coming to see the value of such knowledge.

Since the arrival of General Lingard, she had realised that there were all sorts of things which ordinary women—such women as Jane Oglander and Mabel Digby—know, but which she had never taken the trouble to learn. Lingard had already taught her a good deal. She had early adopted the excellent principle, when with a man, of allowing him to talk, especially when the subject was one about which she knew little or nothing.

Lingard would have been amazed indeed had he known that a fortnight ago Athena Maule had scarcely heard of these subjects—so vitally interesting to those concerned with the expansion of our Empire in Africa—about which she now questioned him so intelligently.

The next day opened with very ill news—the news that Bayworth Kaye was dead.

As is the way in the country, the servants heard the bare fact some time before it reached their betters. It formed the subject of discussion in the servants' hall on the previous evening, for the fatal telegram had reached the rectory at seven o'clock, and its contents had made their way, first to the stables of Rede Place, and from thence to the house half an hour later, at the very time Lingard was echoing Athena's words, "If only you were free!"

"You'll 'ave to tell her when you go in with the cup of tea," observed Mr. Maule's valet to Mrs. Maule's French maid, FÉlicie. But the woman shrugged her shoulders, with a "Ma foi, non!"

They had all wondered, with sighs and mysterious winks, how Mrs. Maule would take the news. The Corsican chef expressed great concern. "Ce pauvre jeune homme est mort d'amour!" he exclaimed to FÉlicie, and she nodded solemnly, explaining and expanding his remark to the others.

"Gammon! An Englishman—an officer and a gentleman—don't die of such a thing as love," the butler said scornfully, and FÉlicie again had shrugged her shoulders. What did these unimaginative barbarians know of the tender passion?—nothing, save when it touched their own sluggish souls and bodies. Poor Monsieur Bayworth—so young, so gallant, always kindly and civil to FÉlicie herself. So unlike that prude, his mamma! FÉlicie had but one regret—that she had never seen Monsieur Bayworth in uniform.

Wantele was told the next morning. Bayworth Kaye—Bayworth, whom he had known with an affectionate, kindly knowledge from his birth upwards—dead? He felt a sharp pang remembering how coldly he and the young man had said good-bye less than a month ago. After all, it was not Bayworth who had been to blame for all that had happened during the last year....

He came down to breakfast hoping that the news which he had himself learnt but a few moments before was already known to Athena. If that were the case, she would probably stay upstairs. Breakfast in bed is one of the many agreeable privileges civilised life offers woman.

Only since General Lingard had been staying at Rede Place had Mrs. Maule come down each morning. She had evidently begun doing so during those three days which had laid so solid a foundation to her friendship with Lingard.

But if Athena were still in ignorance of young Kaye's death, then to him, Wantele, must fall the painful, the odious, task of telling her. He could not be so cruel as to allow her to discover the fact from the morning papers. Of late—and again Dick traced a connection between the fact and Lingard's presence at Rede Place—Mrs. Maule generally glanced over one of the papers before opening her letters.

Lingard came into the dining-room, and then, a moment after, Mrs. Maule and Jane Oglander together.

Wantele glanced quickly at his cousin's wife. With relief he told himself that Athena had heard the melancholy news. She looked ill and tired, her eyelids were red, her beauty curiously obscured.

She came up languidly to the breakfast table, and Lingard looked at her solicitously. She put out her hand and let it rest for a moment in his grasp. Her hand was cold, and he muttered a word of concern.

"I couldn't sleep," she said. "I shall have to take chloral again—it's the only vice Richard and I ever had in common!"

Lingard turned abruptly away. It had become disagreeable to him to hear her utter Richard Maule's name. And Athena felt suddenly discomfited. The plans she had made in the night became remote from reality.

She sat down and her eyes began following Lingard. He was waiting on Jane, taking trouble to get Jane what he supposed she liked to eat—and leaving her, Athena, his hostess, to Dick Wantele's care.

So far, she had never had the power to make Lingard neglect Jane in those small material things which mean so much to some women and so little to others. Personal service meant a great deal to Athena Maule. The sight of Lingard and Jane Oglander together was becoming unendurable to her.

"D'ye know, Dick, if there's any more news of Bayworth Kaye?"

It was Jane who spoke. She also felt ill and tired; she also had not slept that night; but Lingard's anxious look and muttered word of concern had not been for her. True, he was "looking after her" now, bringing her food she had no wish to eat, making her—and what a mockery it was—his special care.

But what was this that Dick was saying in so hushed a voice, in answer to her idle question?

"Yes, I'm sorry to say there is news—bad news."

The speaker was intensely conscious of Athena's presence. Did she know, or did she not know, what he was about to say? He added slowly, "Poor Bayworth Kaye is dead."

Jane uttered an exclamation of horror and concern. Athena said nothing; but she took a piece of toast out of the tiny rack in front of her plate, and began crumbling it in her hand.

"Yes, it's a terrible thing"—Wantele was now speaking to Lingard. "The poor fellow was an only son—indeed, an only child. We've known him all his life. It will be a shock to Richard——" He talked on, and still Athena remained silent.

But when at last Jane turned to her with, "I suppose you will be going down to the rectory this morning?" Mrs. Maule threw back her head and spoke with a touch of angry excitement in her voice:—

"Why did you tell me now, Dick, before breakfast? You've made me miserable—miserable! You know I hate being told of anyone's death. I hate death! No, I shan't go to the rectory—you can go, Jane, and say all that should be said from Richard and from me."

Lingard looked severely at Wantele. How stupid, how heartless, the young man was always showing himself! Why had he hastened to tell sad news which he must have known would so much distress Athena and Jane Oglander?

"I'm so sorry! I was afraid you would see it in one of the papers," Wantele spoke as if he did indeed repent of his cruel lack of thought.

Athena accepted his apology in silence. After a while she turned to her guest:—

"I wish you had met poor Bayworth Kaye," she said musingly, "he was just the sort of man you would have liked. He was tremendously keen——" Then she stopped short; looking up she had met Dick Wantele's light-coloured eyes fixed on her face with an expression of—was it extreme surprise or angry disgust?

She looked straight at him: "Don't you agree, Dick?"

"Yes, yes," he said hastily, "I certainly agree," and his eyes wavered and fell before her frank, questioning gaze.