Henson.

"Madam has had a refreshing rest?" Henson suggested. "Pardon our anxious
curiosity."

Again Enid raged, but Margaret Henson might have been of stone for all
the notice she took. The far-away look was still in her eyes as she felt
her way to the table like one in a dream. Then she dropped suddenly into
a chair and began grace in a high, clear voice.

".... And the Lord make us truly thankful. And may He, when it seemeth
good to Him, remove the curse from this house and in due season free the
innocent and punish the guilty. For the burden is sore upon us, and there
are times when it seems hard to bear."

The big man played with his knife and fork, smilingly. An acute observer
might have imagined that the passionate plaint was directed at him. If so
it passed harmlessly over his broad shoulders. In his immaculate evening
dress he looked strangely out of place there. Enid had escaped the
prevailing dilapidation, but her gown of grey homespun was severe as the
garb of a charity girl.

"Madam is so poetical," Henson murmured. "And charmingly sanguine."

"Williams," Mrs. Henson said, quite stoically, "my visitor will have some
champagne."

She seemed to have dropped once again into the commonplace, painfully
exact as a hostess of breeding must be to an unwelcome guest. And yet she
never seemed to see him; those dark eyes were looking, ever looking, into
the dark future. The meal proceeded in silence save for an oily sarcasm
from Henson. In the dense stillness the occasional howl of a dog could be
heard. A slight flush of annoyance crossed Henson's broad face.

"Some day I shall poison all those hounds," he said.

Enid looked up at him swiftly.

"If _all_ the hounds round Longdean were poisoned or shot it would be a
good place to live in," she said.

Henson smiled caressingly, like Petruchio might have done in his
milder moments.

"My dear Enid, you misjudge me," he said. "But I shall get justice
some day."

Enid replied that she fervently hoped so, and thus the strange meal
proceeded with smiles and gentle words from Henson, and a wild outburst
of bitterness from the girl. So far as she was concerned the servants
might have been mere automatons. The dust rose in clouds as the latter
moved silently. It was hot in there, and gradually the brown powder
grimed like a film over Henson's oily skin. At the head of the table
Margaret Henson sat like a woman in a dream. Ever, ever her dark eyes
seemed to be l