t is your conclusion,
Miss Driver, how does it fit in with your conduct?"

"It fits in very well," she replied.

"That wouldn't be the general opinion. It's not the opinion at
Fillingford Manor." He leaned back in his chair, looking rather weary
and discouraged. "You're still minded to fence with me, I see," he said.

"No, I'll deal with you plainly--but I rely on your pledge. Nothing goes
beyond these walls--neither to Fillingford Manor nor elsewhere?"

"I am bound to that: but pretenses are dangerous."

"It will soon be time to end this one."

As she spoke, merry voices floated into the room from the terrace
outside. Jenny listened with a happy smile, and then went on, "You want
to know what I mean by my conduct? Why I make Fillingford Manor unhappy,
and all my neighbors mad with curiosity?" She laughed as she rose from
her chair. "Come to the window here," she said to Alison.

They went to the window, and I followed. There, in the mellow sun of the
late afternoon, Margaret lay on her long chair, her brown hair touched
to gold, her merry laugh breaking out again, her face upturned to
Lacey's. He stood beside her, his eyes set on her face, a smile of
admiration plain to see on his lips. It was a fair picture of young
lovers--and the complacent artist whose hand had designed it turned
triumphantly to Alison.

"You ask what I mean. I mean that," she said.

Alison gave a violent start. "Miss Octon! And Amyas?" He looked for a
moment at the pair, then turned back to Jenny, rather helplessly. "But
that's pretty nearly as bad as the other!" he blurted out.

"Who speaks now?" she asked. "The priest in his office? Or Mr. Worldly
Wiseman?"

CHAPTER XXII

THE ALTERNATIVE

Alison watched the maid and the young man for half a minute, then drew
back a little way into the room; Jenny followed as far as the piano and
stood leaning her elbows on the top of it, smiling at him in mockery.

"That's a fair question, perhaps. But the idea is--staggering!"

Jenny raised her brows. "But why? Has she practiced deceit and betrayed
trust? Has she broken faith or threatened anybody's honor? Or done worse
things still? Is she no fit wife for a young man? What have you against
her, Mr. Alison? Why is this pretty nearly as bad as the other?"

Alison was sadly put about and flustered. His confident air of authority
vanished with the unimpeachable ground on which it had been founded. He
had shifted his base; the new base fa