"It is, indeed!" Then he sighs wearily; and, giving up all further
examination of her lovely unforgiving face, he turns his gaze upon the
fire. "Look here," he says, presently; "I heard unavoidably what you
said to Kennedy that afternoon at the castle, that we could manage to
get on without each other excellently well on occasion: you alluded to
yourself, I suppose. Perhaps you think we might get on even better had
we never met."

"I didn't say that," says Georgie, turning pale.

"I understand,"--bitterly: "you only meant it. Well, if you are so
unhappy with me, and if--if you wish for a separation, I think I can
manage it for you. I have no desire whatever"--coldly--"to keep you
with me against your will."

"And have all the world talking?" exclaims she, hastily. "No. In such
a case the woman goes to the wall: the man is never in fault. Things
must now remain as they are. But this one last thing you can do for
me. As far as is possible, let us live as utter strangers to each
other."

"It shall be just as you please," returns he, haughtily.

* * * * *

Day by day the dark cloud that separates them widens and deepens,
drifting them farther and farther apart, until it seems almost
impossible that they shall ever come together again.

Dorian grows moody and irritable, and nurses his wrongs in sullen
morbid silence. He will shoot whole days without a companion, or go
for long purposeless rides across country, only to return at nightfall
weary and sick at heart.

"Grief is a stone that bears one down." To Dorian, all the world seems
going wrong; his whole life is a failure. The two beings he loves most
on earth--Lord Sartoris and his wife--distrust him, and willingly lend
an open ear to the shameless story unlucky Fate has coined for him.

As for Georgie, she grows pale and thin, and altogether unlike
herself. From being a gay, merry, happy little girl, with "the sun
upon her heart," as Bailey so sweetly expresses it, she has changed
into a woman, cold and self-contained, with a manner full of settled
reserve.

Now and again small scenes occur between them that only render matters
more intolerable. For instance, coming into the breakfast-room one
morning, Georgie, meeting the man who brings the letters, takes them
from him, and, dividing them, comes upon one directed to Dorian, in an
unmistakable woman's hand, bearing the London post-mark, which she
throws across the table to he