anything dreadful, please? Lord Parham is your guest,
and my political chief. Is there any woman in England who would not do
her best to be civil to him under the circumstances?"

"I suppose not," said Kitty, with deliberation. "No, I don't think there
can be."

"Kitty!"

For the first time Ashe was conscious of real exasperation. What was to
be done with a temperament and a disposition like this?

"Do you never think that you have it in your power to help me or to ruin
me?" he said, with vehemence.

"Oh yes--often. I mean--to help you--in my own way."

Ashe's laugh was a sound of pure annoyance.

"But please understand, it would be <i>infinitely</i> better if you would
help me, in <i>my</i> way--in the natural, accepted way--the way that
everybody understands."

"The way Lord Parham recommends?" Kitty looked at him quietly. "Never
mind, William. I <i>am</i> trying to help you."

Her eyes shone with the strangest glitter. Ashe was conscious of another
of those sudden stabs of anxiety about her which he had felt at
intervals through the preceding year. His face softened.

"Dear, don't let's talk nonsense! Just look at me sometimes at dinner,
and say to yourself, 'William asks me--for his sake--to be nice to Lord
Parham.'"

He again drew her to him, but she repulsed him almost with violence.

"Why is he here? Why have we people dining? We ought to be alone--in the
dark!"

Her face had become a white mask. Her breast rose and fell, as though
she fought with sobs.

"Kitty--what do you mean?" He recoiled in dismay.

"Harry!"--she just breathed the word between her closed lips.

"My darling!" cried Ashe, "I saw Dr. Rotherham myself this afternoon. He
gave the most satisfactory account, and Margaret told me she had
repeated everything to you. The child will soon be himself again."

"He is <i>dying</i>!" said Kitty, in the same low, remote voice, her gaze
still fixed on Ashe.

"Kitty! Don't say such things--don't think them!" Ashe had himself grown
pale. "At any rate"--he turned on her reproachfully--"tell me <i>why</i> you
think them. Confide in me, Kitty. Come and talk to me about the boy. But
three-fourths of the time you behave as though there were nothing the
matter with him--you won't even see the doctor--and then you say a thing
like this!"

She was silent a moment; then with a wild gesture of the head and
shoulders, as of one shaking off a weight, she moved away--drew on her
long gloves--and goi