reed. "You have had all the opportunities which any
man should need, of explaining certain matters to me. My curiosity
in them has ended; also my interest--in you. You say you are going to
London. Very well. Pray do not hurry home on my account."

Sir Henry, as he turned to leave the room, made the common mistake of a
man arguing with a woman--he attempted to have the last word.

"Perhaps I am better out of the way, eh?"

"Perhaps so," Philippa assented sweetly.

CHAPTER XXVI

Philippa, late that afternoon, found what she sought--solitude. She had
walked along the sands until Dreymarsh lay out of sight on the other
side of a spur of the cliffs. Before her stretched a long and level
plain, a fringe of sand, and a belt of shingly beach. There was not a
sign of any human being in sight, and of buildings only a quaint tower
on the far horizon.

She found a dry place on the pebbles, removed her hat and sat down, her
hands clasped around her knees, her eyes turned seaward. She had
come out here to think, but it was odd how fugitive and transient her
thoughts became. Her husband was always there in the background, but
in those moments it was Lessingham who was the predominant figure. She
remembered his earnestness, his tender solicitude for her, the courage
which, when necessity demanded, had flamed up in him, a born and natural
quality. She remembered the agony of those few minutes on the preceding
day, when nothing but what still seemed a miracle had saved him. At one
moment she felt herself inclined to pray that he might never come back.
At another, her heart ached to see him once more. She knew so well
that if he came it would be for her sake, that he would come to ask her
finally the question with which she had fenced. She knew, too, that his
coming would be the moment of her life. She was so much of a woman, and
the passionate craving of her sex to give love for love was there in her
heart, almost omnipotent. And in the background there was that bitter
desire to bring suffering upon the man who had treated her like a child,
who had placed her in a false position with all other women, who had
dawdled and idled away his days, heedless of his duty, heedless of every
serious obligation. When she tried to reason, her way seemed so clear,
and yet, behind it all, there was that cold impulse of almost Victorian
prudishness, the inheritance of a long line of virtuous women, a
prudishness which she had once, when she h