indeed things seemed to him more bald than they
really were. His proud spirit chafed from morning to night--chafed
hopelessly against the knowledge that his own action had bound him as no
ordinary bond of an engagement could. His whole personality appeared to
be changing; he was taciturn or cynically caustic, casting jibes at all
manner of things he had once held sacred. But after a week of abject
misery, he refused to bear any more, and when Mrs. Cricklander grew
tired of Florence, and decided to move on to Venice, he announced his
intention of taking a few days' tour by himself. He wished to see the
country round, he said, and especially make an excursion to San
Gimignano--that gem of all Italy for its atmosphere of the past.

"Oh! I am thoroughly tired of these moldy places," Mrs. Cricklander
announced. "The Maulevriers are in Venice, and we can have a delightful
time at the Lido; the new hotel is quite good--you had much better come
on with me now. Moping alone cannot benefit anyone. You really ought to
cheer up and get quite well, John."

But he was firm, and after some bickerings she was obliged to decide to
go to Venice alone with Arabella, and let her _fiance_ depart in his
motor early the next morning.

Their parting was characteristic.

"Good night, Cecilia," John Derringham said. No matter how capricious
she could be, he always treated her with ceremonious politeness. "I am
leaving so very early to-morrow, we had better say good-by now. I hope
my going does not really inconvenience you at all. I want a little rest
from your friends, and, when I join you at Venice again, I hope you will
let me see more of yourself."

She put up her face, and kissed him with all the girlish rippling smiles
she had used for his seduction in the beginning.

"Why, certainly," she said. "We will be regular old Darbys-and-Joans; so
don't you forget while you are away that you belong to me, and I am not
going to give you up to anything or anybody--so long as I want you
myself!"

And John Derringham had gone to his room feeling more chained than ever,
and more bitterly resentful against fate.

As soon as he left her, she sat down at her writing-table and wrote out
a telegram to be sent off the first thing the next day. It contained
only three words, and was not signed.

But the recipient of it, Mr. Hanbury-Green, read it with wild emotion
when he received it in his rooms in London--and immediately made
arrangements to set o