t, and,
stepping to the threshold of the shop, she called into the depths that
she would soon return.

Without any attempt at secrecy she followed that pair absorbed in one
another. She went because there was no choice, she was impelled by her
necessity to know and unhindered by any scruples, and when she had seen
the two pass down the quiet road leading to his house, with his hand on
her elbow and her face turned to his, Helen went back to the young man
and the bales of cloth.

She chose the corduroy and left the shop, and it was not long before she
found herself outside the town, but she could remember nothing of her
passage. She came to a standstill where the moor road stretched before
her, and there she suffered realization to fall on her with the weight
of many waters. She cried out under the shock, and, turning, she ran
without stopping until she came to Zebedee's door.

An astonished maid tried not to stare at this flushed and elegant lady.

"The doctor is engaged, miss," she said.

"I shall wait. Please tell him that I must see him."

"What name shall I say?"

"Miss Caniper. Miss Helen Caniper." She had no memory of any other.

She sat on one of the hard leather chairs and looked at a fern that died
reluctantly in the middle of the table. Her eyes burned and would not be
eased by tears, her heart leapt erratically in her breast, yet the one
grievance of which she was exactly conscious was that Zebedee had a new
servant and had not told her. If she had to have her tinker, surely
Zebedee might have kept Eliza. She was invaded by a cruel feeling of his
injustice; but her thoughts grew vague as she sat there, and her dry
lips parted and closed, as though they tried to frame words and could
not. For what seemed a long, long time, she could hear the sound of
voices through the wall: then the study door was opened, a girl laughed,
Zebedee spoke; another door was opened, there were steps on the path and
the gate clicked. She sat motionless, still staring at the fern, but
when Zebedee entered she looked up at him and spoke.

"Zebedee," she said miserably.

"Come into my room," he said.

The door was shut on them, and she dropped against it.

"Zebedee, I can't bear it."

"My little life!"

"I was so happy," she said piteously, "and, in the street, I saw you
with that girl. You held her arm, and I had to come to you. I had,
Zebedee."

"Had you, dear?" he said. He was pulling off her gloves, gently and
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