l?"

The words restored his self-possession. "Ill? Of course not. They told
me you were out and I came upstairs."

The books lay between them on the table; he wondered when she would see
them. She lingered tentatively on the threshold, with the air of leaving
his explanation on his hands. She was not the kind of woman who could be
counted on to fortify an excuse by appearing to dispute it.

"Where have you been?" Glennard asked, moving forward so that he
obstructed her vision of the books.

"I walked over to the Dreshams for tea."

"I can't think what you see in those people," he said with a shrug;
adding, uncontrollably--"I suppose Flamel was there?"

"No; he left on the yacht this morning."

An answer so obstructing to the natural escape of his irritation left
Glennard with no momentary resource but that of strolling impatiently to
the window. As her eyes followed him they lit on the books.

"Ah, you've brought them! I'm so glad," she exclaimed.

He answered over his shoulder, "For a woman who never reads you make the
most astounding exceptions!"

Her smile was an exasperating concession to the probability that it had
been hot in town or that something had bothered him.

"Do you mean it's not nice to want to read the book?" she asked. "It was
not nice to publish it, certainly; but after all, I'm not responsible
for that, am I?" She paused, and, as he made no answer, went on, still
smiling, "I do read sometimes, you know; and I'm very fond of Margaret
Aubyn's books. I was reading 'Pomegranate Seed' when we first met. Don't
you remember? It was then you told me all about her."

Glennard had turned back into the room and stood staring at his wife.
"All about her?" he repeated, and with the words remembrance came to
him. He had found Miss Trent one afternoon with the novel in her hand,
and moved by the lover's fatuous impulse to associate himself in some
way with whatever fills the mind of the beloved, had broken through
his habitual silence about the past. Rewarded by the consciousness of
figuring impressively in Miss Trent's imagination he had gone on from
one anecdote to another, reviving dormant details of his old Hillbridge
life, and pasturing his vanity on the eagerness with which she received
his reminiscences of a being already clothed in the impersonality of
greatness.

The incident had left no trace in his mind; but it sprang up now like an
old enemy, the more dangerous for having been forgotten.