ou talk about? About us? Did he say anything about me?"

"Of course. What do you suppose? We had quite an argument, because he
seemed to think it a pity that you should injure yourself by fretting,
and I said I didn't see how you could do anything else."

She smiled, and tilted her head, her complacency restored.

"That was it, I suppose! He wanted to talk to you before you saw me.
He is good. And you argued with him, you say? Disagreed, I suppose.
Oh, well--men are always more tender-hearted than women."

I felt annoyed, and munched in silence, staring fixedly at my plate. If
this particular man was so much more understanding, why had she summoned
me from town?

After lurch Delphine ran upstairs to see her husband for a few minutes,
and then returned to me in her little sitting-room. He was tired, she
said, and hoped to sleep until tea. She had not told him of my visit;
he was so listless and apathetic that it worried him to talk, or to have
people talk to him. "I don't believe he will ever be the same again!"

"People always say that in the middle of an illness, but they find their
mistake later on. After a long rest the Vicar will be better than he
has been for years, and it will be your business to see that he never
works so hard again. You were always longing for a change, Delphine.
Think how you will enjoy Switzerland, sitting out in the crisp clear
air, looking at those glorious mountains, with no house or parish to
worry over--nothing to do but wait on your dear man, and watch him
growing stronger every day!"

She looked at me dumbly, while the colour faded out of her cheeks, and
the pretty curved lips twitched and trembled. I saw her clasp her
hands, and brace herself against her chair, and knew that the moment for
confession had come, and that it was difficult to find words.

"No worry!" she repeated slowly. "No worry! But that's just what is
killing me. I'm so worried, so worried that I feel sometimes, Evelyn,
as if I were going out of my mind!"

"You mean--about your husband?" I asked, but the question was really
put as a lead; I knew she was not referring to illness.

Delphine shook her head.

"That is bad enough, but it is not the worst. The worst is that through
me--through my wretched, selfish, vain, discontented folly, I--I have
made it difficult for him even to get well. I--I have got into a
horrible mess, Evelyn, and when he hears of it--when he has to hear, he
will be