esently he mentioned Ferrier's name, and Diana started.

"Does _he_ think it would do you harm--that you ought to give me up?"

"Not he! And if anybody can make my mother hear reason, it will be
Ferrier."

"Lady Lucy believes it would injure you in Parliament?" faltered Diana.

"No, I don't believe she does. No sane person could."

"Then it's because--of the disgrace? Oliver!--perhaps--you ought to give
me up?"

She breathed quick. It stabbed him to see the flush in her cheeks
contending with the misery in her eyes. She could not pose, or play a
part. What she could not hide from him was just the conflict between her
love and her new-born shame. Before that scene on the hill there would
have been her girlish dignity also to reckon with. But the greater had
swallowed up the less; and from her own love--in innocent and simple
faith--she imagined his.

So that when she spoke of his giving her up, it was not her pride that
spoke, but only and truly her fear of doing him a hurt--by which she
meant a hurt in public estimation or repute. The whole business side of
the matter was unknown to her. She had never speculated on his
circumstances, and she was constitutionally and rather proudly
indifferent to questions of money. Vaguely, of course, she knew that the
Marshams were rich and that Tallyn was Lady Lucy's. Beyond, she had
never inquired.

This absence of all self-love in her attitude--together with her
complete ignorance of the calculation in which she was involved--touched
him sharply. It kept him silent about the money; it seemed impossible to
speak of it. And yet all the time the thought of it clamored--perhaps
increasingly--in his own mind.

He told her that they must stand firm--that she must be patient--that
Ferrier would work for them--and Lady Lucy would come round. And she,
loving him more and more with every word, seeing in him a god of
consolation and of chivalry, trusted him wholly. It was characteristic
of her that she did not attempt heroics for the heroics' sake; there was
no idea of renouncing him with a flourish of trumpets. He said he loved
her, and she believed him. But her heart went on its knees to him in a
gratitude that doubled love, even in the midst of her aching
bewilderment and pain.

* * * * *

He made her come out with him before luncheon; he talked with her of
politics and their future; he did his best to scatter the nightmare in
which she moved.