at a slave you are!"

"Behold the white man work!" he said good-naturedly, the flush passing
slowly from his face. With apparent negligence he pushed the letter
and the books and papers a little to one side, but really to place them
beyond the range of her angry eyes. She shrugged her shoulders at his
action.

"For 'the fatherless children and widows, and all that are desolate and
oppressed?'" she said, not concealing her malice, for at the wedding
she had just left all her married life had rushed before her in a swift
panorama, and the man in scarlet had fixed the shooting pictures in her
mind.

Again a flush swept up Charley's face and seemed to blur his sight. His
monocle dropped the length of its silken tether, and he caught it and
slowly adjusted it again as he replied evenly:

"You always hit the nail on the head, Kathleen." There was a kind of
appeal in his voice, a sort of deprecation in his eye, as though he
would be friends with her, as though, indeed, there was in his mind some
secret pity for her.

Her look at his face was critical and cold. It was plain that she was
not prepared for any extra friendliness on his part--there seemed no
reason why he should add to his usual courtesy a note of sympathy to
the sound of her name on his lips. He had not fastened the door of the
cupboard from which he had taken the liqueur, and it had swung open a
little, disclosing the bottle and the glass. She saw. Her face took on a
look of quiet hardness.

"Why did you not come to the wedding? She was your cousin. People asked
where you were. You knew I was going."

"Did you need me?" he asked quietly, and his eyes involuntarily swept
to the place where he had seen the heliotrope and scarlet make a glow of
colour on the other side of the square. "You were not alone."

She misunderstood him. Her mind had been overwrought, and she caught
insinuation in his voice. "You mean Tom Fairing!" Her eyes blazed. "You
are quite right--I did not need you. Tom Fairing is a man that all the
world trusts save you."

"Kathleen!" The words were almost a cry. "For God's sake! I have never
thought of 'trusting' men where you are concerned. I believe in no
man"--his voice had a sharp bitterness, though his face was smooth and
unemotional--"but I trust you, and believe in you. Yes, upon my soul and
honour, Kathleen."

As he spoke she turned quickly and stepped towards the window, an
involuntary movement of agitation. He had touched a ch