on. Had he learned
the ugly secret in the ordinary way Christopher would not have hesitated
for a moment. He would have forbidden Sellon the house in terms which
should leave no sort of margin for dispute. But then--the manner of his
information. There lay the rub. Never in the whole course of his life
had Christopher Selwood found himself in so difficult--so perplexing a
situation.

Then he did the very worst thing he could have done. He resolved to
take his wife into confidence in the matter at once. Bundling the whole
heap of correspondence into his pocket again, he rose, and took his way
to the sheep-kraals for the evening count-in. But it is to be feared
that if Gomfana or old Jacob had carelessly left a sheep or two in the
veldt that evening _pro bono_ the jackals, their master was too
uncertain in his count to be sure of it.

Mrs Selwood's indignation at the disclosure was as great as that of her
husband, but the method by which that disclosure had come about,
womanlike, she dismissed as a comparative trifle. Indeed, had she been
the one to open the letter, it is pretty safe to assert that so far from
resting content with the fragment which Christopher had found more than
enough, she would have read it through to the bitter end. For to the
feminine mind the axiom that "the end justifies the means" is a
thoroughly sound one. Not one woman in fifty can resist the temptation
of reading a letter which she is not meant to read when it is safe to do
so, and not one in ten thousand if she suspects any particular reason
why she should be left in ignorance of its contents.

"Well, now, Hilda, what's to be done?" said Selwood, when he had told
her--for with scrupulous honour he had refused to let her see one word
of the letter itself. It was only intended for one person's eyes. It
was horribly unfortunate that two had seen it, but it would be worse
still to extend the privilege to a third.

"What's to be done?" she echoed. "It's a shocking business, and the man
must be an arrant scoundrel. The only thing to be done is, in the first
place, to request him not to return here; in the next, to sound Violet
herself. Things may not have gone so far as we think, but I'm very much
afraid they have. Why, latterly the girl has become quite changed, and
for a week or so before he left she could hardly bear him out of her
sight."

"Yes, that'll be the best plan, I suppose," acquiesced Chris, ruefully.

"I hope V