"Nous devrions baiser les pantoufles de certaines femmes du cÔtÉ oÙ les pantoufles touchent À la terre, car en dedans ce serait tout au plus digne des anges."

The long day came to an end at last. Jane felt a sense of almost physical relief in the knowledge that to-morrow night she would no longer be there, and yet she had not spoken of her decision to the others.

For Athena Maule the day was not yet over. She waited till the house was sunk into darkness and stillness, and then, dismissing her maid, she put on a dressing-gown and went downstairs to the library.

The book she had mentally marked down that morning was found by her in a moment; but instead of looking at it there she took it to her boudoir. It was possible that Wantele—Wantele who had been so rude and unkind to her this afternoon—might, like herself, feel wakeful, and come down to the library.

With the heavy old law book in her arms, she made her way through the now dark corridor which ran the whole length of Rede Place till she reached her own sitting-room, and there, before turning up the light, she locked the door.

Then she sat down, and drawing forward a little table she spread the book out open before her.

The dying wood fire suddenly burst into flame; Athena looked round her. She wondered if she would ever have so pretty a room again.

There was no hurry; she knew all that it was really necessary for her to know, thanks to Maud Stanwood's idle words.

Maud Stanwood? What would Maud Stanwood say of her when she heard what Mrs. Maule was about to do? So wondering, Athena suddenly made up her mind that there would be no necessity for her to go on knowing that lady. A woman who talked as Maud Stanwood talked would be no friend for General Lingard's wife!

The important thing—the one thing she must find out, and that this book would doubtless tell her—was how long a period must elapse after the dissolution of her marriage to Richard Maule before any second marriage contracted by her would be legal. She was aware that after a divorce a full six months must elapse between the Nisi and the Absolute; also that it was actually left to the good feeling of the offended party—that was very unfair—as to whether the decree should be made absolute at all.

Athena felt a tremor of fear. It would indeed be an awful thing if she put it into Richard's power to leave her in the disagreeable, the ridiculous, position of being neither married nor single.

But thanks to the excellent index of this useful work on the marriage laws of England, it only took Mrs. Maule a very few moments to discover that in this important matter her fear was quite groundless. Once judgment was given—once, that is, a marriage was dissolved—there was no impediment to an immediate remarriage on the part of the injured party.

She looked up and gave a long, unconscious sigh of relief. There had been a secret, unacknowledged terror in her heart, that she might find, now at the last moment, some hidden snag.

Sitting back in her straight, carved Italian chair, she began to make a mental list of her large circle of acquaintances. Which of them would give her shelter during the weeks, nay the months, that must perhaps elapse before she would be free?

Mrs. Maule had but one intimate friend—that friend was Jane Oglander. She had little doubt that as soon as the painful business of the engagement was over, she and Jane would return to their old terms of unquestioning affection.

What a pity it was that Hew Lingard's rather absurd conscience and his—well, his sense of delicacy, would make any arrangement with Jane impossible! However, she knew several good-natured women who might help her through such a pass—especially if she could venture to whisper the truth as to what the future held for her....

But there were certain other facts it would be well for her to know before taking so important a step as that of consulting a lawyer. Athena Maule did not believe in trusting people too much.

Bending once more over the table, she set herself seriously to study the sense of the dry and yet very clearly expressed chapter containing the information she sought.

And then, as she read on, slowly mastering the legal phraseology, conning over the cases quoted in support of each assertion, it gradually became horribly, piteously plain to her that if her husband cared to defend the suit, she had but a very poor chance of obtaining what this work so rightly styled "relief."

The knowledge brought with it a terrible feeling of revolt and of despair to Athena Maule.

She pushed the book away, then got up and stared into a small Venetian looking-glass. She was frightened by what she saw there; the shock of her discovery had drained all the colour from her face, and, for the moment, destroyed her youth.

She turned away from the mirror with a feeling of sick disgust. Her face, as reflected there, actually reminded her of Richard's face. It was absurd, disquieting, that such a notion should ever come into her mind, and it showed the state in which her nerves must be.

She looked round her fearfully. The room on which she had wasted a regretful thought had become an airless cage in which she would have to spend all that remained to her of young life and of the wonderful beauty which had, so she now told herself bitterly, brought her so little happiness.

She had actually believed—how Richard would grin if he knew it!—that if she only could make up her mind to a certain amount of "scandal" and "publicity," she could free herself of him. How could she have supposed that the law—a law framed and devised by men—would put such a power in a woman's hand?...

And yet—and yet it was still true that nothing but Richard's will stood between herself and complete, honourable freedom—between her and the man who had in his gift everything that she longed for and believed herself specially fitted by nature to possess.

So much, and surely it was a great deal, the book which was still lying open on the little table made quite clear. If only Richard Maule could be brought to that state of mind in which he would consent to be merciful and leave his wife's suit undefended, all would yet go well.

Athena sat down again and began to concentrate her mind intensely.

How could she bend, coerce Richard to her will?—that was the formidable problem which was now presented to her, and she set herself to consider it from every point of view.

Mrs. Maule was afraid of her husband—it was an instinctive, involuntary fear; her whole being shrank from him with a dreadful aversion. When he had been hale and strong, adoring her with the rather absurd ardour of adoration a middle-aged man so often lavishes on a young wife, she had despised him. Now that he was stricken, old, and feeble, he inspired her with terror.

It had amused her to deceive him when he had been the doting, lover-like husband, in days which seemed to belong to another life; but now, when his sunken eyes gleamed as they always gleamed when staring into hers, seeming full of a cruel knowledge of the pardonable weaknesses into which her heart betrayed her, then her body as well as her spirit quailed.

Suddenly a great light came into the dark chamber of her mind. Athena Maule saw in a moment a way in which the problem might be solved. How amazing that she had not thought of it yesterday—even this morning!

Jane Oglander should be her advocate with Richard. Richard would do for Jane what he would do for no one else. That had been proved many times. To take a recent instance—how harshly he had always resisted his wife's wish to ask people to Rede Place! But when General Lingard had come into the neighbourhood, it was Richard who had suggested that Jane Oglander's lover should be bidden to stay, and to stay a long time.

Athena's face became flushed, fired with hope, with energy. She had been foolish to be so frightened. How fortunate it was that Jane had spoken to her—had told her of her intention to break the foolish engagement with Lingard! It made everything quite easy.

She shut the book—the sinister old book which had given her so awful a shock.

Why not go up and see Jane now—at once? It was still early, not much after midnight. Athena glanced at the tiny clock which had played its little part just before Jane's arrival at Rede Place in provoking Hew Lingard's avowal of—of weakness. Yes, it was only ten minutes past twelve. Jane was probably wide awake still.

Athena went to the library and carefully put back the volume in its place among the other legal books which had belonged to Wantele's father. Then she made her way, in the deep, still darkness, to the door of Jane Oglander's room. Knocking lightly, and without waiting for an answer, she walked in.

In old days this room had been known as "the White Room," now it went by the name of "Miss Oglander's Room." Only Jane Oglander ever occupied it.

Jane was asleep—sleeping more soundly than she had done for many days, but as the door of her room opened she woke, and sitting up turned on, with an instinctive gesture, the electric light which swung over her bed.

Athena came quickly across the room. She was wearing a rather bright blue silk wrapper, and her graceful form made a patch of brilliant colour against the varying whitenesses of the walls, of the curtains, and of the rugs which covered the floor.

"I couldn't get to sleep," Athena's voice shook with excitement and emotion, for she was going to take a great risk—to stake her whole future life on one throw. "Somehow I guessed you were awake, like me."

Jane looked at Athena without speaking; she was telling herself that Hew could not help being enthralled—that no man could have helped it. She had never seen her friend look as lovely as she looked to-night; and there was a pathetic, a very appealing expression on the beautiful face now bending over her.

Mrs. Maule kissed Jane Oglander.

Then she straightened herself.

"I can't sleep because I keep thinking of all you told me this morning," she said at last. "I know you don't want to talk about it, and yet—and yet I feel I must tell you that what you told me is making me wretched, Jane. Are you sure that you really wish to break off your engagement?"

Jane was very pale; she was spent with suffering, and yet, as Athena saw with a pang of envy, she looked very young; her fair hair lay in two long thick plaits, one on each side of her face. It was that perhaps which made her look so young, so placid—so defenceless.

"It seems to me the only thing I can do," she spoke in a very low voice, but to the woman listening she seemed irritatingly calm.

Athena climbed on to Jane's bed, as she had so often done in the days when she and Jane happened to be at Rede Place together—days which had come far oftener four and five years ago than recently.

It hurt Jane to see Athena there. The contrast between the past and the present cut so shrewdly. She did not wish to judge her friend—or rather she did judge her, and very leniently.

Athena could not help what had happened. Of that Jane felt sure. But still Athena must know the truth—she could not but be aware of the effect she had had on Lingard; she must know that without meaning it she had witched his heart away.

But whatever Athena knew or did not know, any allusion to what had happened would be degrading to them both. Certain things slumber when left in peace; they leap into life if once discussed. Jane Oglander believed in the honour of the man she loved. Hew would go away, and in time he would batten down, fight and conquer his infatuation for Mrs. Maule.

"Of course I wish to break my engagement. But I would rather not talk about it," she said, at last.

"But I must talk about it!" cried Athena desperately. "You don't realise how I feel, Jane, how—how miserable, how ashamed I am about it all! Of course I know how you must be hating me."

An expression of anguish came over the younger woman's face. She believed her friend. But deep in her heart was breathed the inarticulate prayer: "Oh God, do not let her mention Hew—do not let her speak of Hew!"

Athena suddenly covered her face with her hands. "Oh, Jane, I could not help it," she wailed, in her low, vibrating voice. "Oh, Jane, tell me that you know I could not help it!"

"I know you could not help it," repeated Jane mechanically.

She was being tortured,—tortured with a singular refinement of cruelty. But even now she did not blame Athena. Athena had meant kindly by her in coming here to-night. But oh! if she would only go away. It was agony to Jane to see her there.

"He respects you!" whispered Mrs. Maule, leaning forward. "He admires you! He esteems you! Oh, Jane, I should feel proud if any man spoke of me as he speaks of you——"

But Jane did not feel proud. Jane felt humiliated to the dust. During the many miserable hours she had spent in the last fortnight, she had been spared the hateful suspicion that Hew Lingard ever spoke of her to Athena Maule.

And indeed Lingard had never so spoken, yet the strange thing was that Athena, when uttering those lying words, half believed them to be true. In the first days of her acquaintance with Lingard, she had herself said many kind, warm, affectionate things of Jane Oglander, to which he had perforce assented. It now pleased her to imagine, and even more to say, that it was he who had spoken those words of praise, of liking, of warm but unlover-like affection....

"If you only knew how he feels," she went on rapidly, "you would feel sorry for him, Jane, deeply sorry; not, as you have a right to feel, angry—angry both with him and with me! I'm afraid—I know, that often he feels wretched—horribly wretched about it all."

"I am very sorry," said Jane Oglander in a low voice, "sorry, not—not angry, Athena——" and then she stopped short.

"Sorry" seemed a poor, inadequate word, but it was the only word she could find. Her heart was wrung with sorrow, with unavailing, useless sorrow for both these unhappy people, as well as for herself. Judging them by what she would have felt had she been either of them, she believed them to be very miserable.

Athena was now huddled up on the bed. She was crying bitterly, her face hidden in her hands, the tears trickling through the fingers. She was dreadfully, dreadfully sorry for herself.

Jane Oglander could not see anyone as unhappy and as abased as she believed her friend to be feeling, and make no attempt at consolation. Bending forward, she put out her arms and gathered to her the slender rounded shoulders, the beautiful dark head.

"If only something could be done," she whispered, "if only there was a way out, Athena!"

Athena Maule raised her tear-stained face. Her moment had at last come.

"There is a way out," she said slowly, impressively.

She put the palms of her hands on the other woman's breast—"Tell me, Jane, would it make you very unhappy, would you ever be able to forgive me—if I married Hew Lingard?"

Jane looked at her with troubled eyes. "I don't understand," she faltered. "Do you mean when—when Richard is dead, Athena?"

"No. Of course I don't mean that! What a horrible idea! But, Jane, there is a chance that I may become free. It is difficult to explain, but you may believe me when I tell you that if Richard were a different kind of man, if he was noble, if he was high-minded, as you are noble and high-minded——" Jane shook her head.

"Yes, you are—you are——What was I saying? Yes: if Richard were different he could have given me my freedom long ago, and our marriage could be dissolved even now."

As the younger woman made no movement, said no word, only went on looking at her in puzzled silence, Athena drew herself out of Jane's arms, and there came a look of impatience over her face.

"You are not a child! Surely you know what I mean, Jane? You must have heard of marriages being annulled? Richard has kept me tied to him all these years—years that I might have been free."

And, again, the strange thing was that Athena Maule, as she said those words, believed them—with certain mental reservations—to be true. It was certainly true that for the last eight years she, a passionate, living woman, had been tied to death in life.

She would have been shocked, angered, had any still small voice reminded her that the scheme she was now determined to carry through was a new scheme, one that she had never considered seriously till now, though she had told the lie which was the keystone of her scheme so often that she had at last begun to believe it must be true.

"Oh, Jane!" she cried, and then she slipped off the bed and threw herself on her knees. "Oh, Jane, there is only one person in the world to whom Richard will ever listen——No, I'm wrong—there are two—there's Dick as well as you. But Dick"—a look of hatred for a moment convulsed her face—"Dick loathes me," she said slowly, "even more than Richard does," and this was true.

"You, Jane, are my only hope—mine and Hew's only hope——"

"Do you mean," said Jane slowly, "that you want me to speak to Richard, Athena,—to suggest his taking this step?"

For the first time Jane Oglander felt a touch of physical repulsion from Athena. It was a curious sensation, and one which troubled her exceedingly.

"Richard would have to do nothing—nothing! Simply leave my suit undefended. And if you could bring yourself to speak to him, Jane, I honestly believe that he might do now what he ought to have done long ago—release me. Nothing can give me back the years—the long miserable years I have spent with him, but I should at least have the future——"

She looked furtively at Jane. It would be so much more—well, comfortable, if she and Lingard could count on Jane's approval, on her blessing, as it were.

Jane Oglander lay back and turned her face away, to the wall. Athena, with remarkable self-control, stilled her eager, impulsive tongue. But the moments of waiting seemed very long.

At last Jane turned and once more sat up. She had made up her mind that it was her duty—her duty, not only to Athena, but also to Hew Lingard,—to do this difficult, this repulsive thing which was being required of her.

"I will speak to Richard to-morrow, Athena—but if he is shocked, if he is hurt by what I shall say to him—and I fear he will be both—you must not expect me ever to come back to Rede Place."

Mrs. Maule gave a little cry. It was only now that she realised how doubtful she had been of success. She might have known Jane better. Jane had always been her one loyal friend. Athena was fond of the word "loyal."

"Oh, Jane," she said humbly, "I—I don't know how to thank you. Will you mind very much?"

"You mustn't be surprised if I fail," Jane said slowly.

Athena again sank on to her knees. But all the humility had gone from the voice in which she uttered her words. "Oh, but you mustn't fail, Jane! It would kill me." She hesitated—"You will be very careful what you say to Richard? You will not—you need not mention——"

Jane put out her hand with a quick gesture as if to ward off the name Athena was about to utter.

"No, no," she cried vehemently, and it was the first time she had spoken with any strength in her tones. "You need not be afraid. Of course I shall mention no one—I think you can trust me, Athena."