the porch, there broke from her in a low plaintive scream the words,
'He's dying--dying! O God, save us!' She began to sink down, and would
have fallen had not Manston caught her. The chief bridesmaid applied her
vinaigrette.

'What did she say?' inquired Manston.

Owen was the only one to whom the words were intelligible, and he was
far too deeply impressed, or rather alarmed, to reply. She did not
faint, and soon began to recover her self-command. Owen took advantage
of the hindrance to step back to where the apparition had been seen.
He was enraged with Springrove for what he considered an unwarrantable
intrusion.

But Edward was not in the chantry. As he had come, so he had gone,
nobody could tell how or whither.

4. AFTERNOON

It might almost have been believed that a transmutation had taken place
in Cytherea's idiosyncrasy, that her moral nature had fled.

The wedding-party returned to the house. As soon as he could find an
opportunity, Owen took his sister aside to speak privately with her
on what had happened. The expression of her face was hard, wild, and
unreal--an expression he had never seen there before, and it disturbed
him. He spoke to her severely and sadly.

'Cytherea,' he said, 'I know the cause of this emotion of yours. But
remember this, there was no excuse for it. You should have been woman
enough to control yourself. Remember whose wife you are, and don't
think anything more of a mean-spirited fellow like Springrove; he had
no business to come there as he did. You are altogether wrong, Cytherea,
and I am vexed with you more than I can say--very vexed.'

'Say ashamed of me at once,' she bitterly answered.

'I am ashamed of you,' he retorted angrily; 'the mood has not left you
yet, then?'

'Owen,' she said, and paused. Her lip trembled; her eye told of
sensations too deep for tears. 'No, Owen, it has not left me; and I will
be honest. I own now to you, without any disguise of words, what last
night I did not own to myself, because I hardly knew of it. I love
Edward Springrove with all my strength, and heart, and soul. You call me
a wanton for it, don't you? I don't care; I have gone beyond caring for
anything!' She looked stonily into his face and made the speech calmly.

'Well, poor Cytherea, don't talk like that!' he said, alarmed at her
manner.

'I thought that I did not love him at all,' she went on hysterically. 'A
year and a half had passed since we met. I could go by the gate o