it, Kitty's voice and Sir Walter's.

Hesitating, half-turning to go back, it was as if a childish panic of
shyness seized him, so that he smiled at himself as he stood there, in
the arrested attitude of an involuntary eavesdropper. But the smile
faded. A look of bewilderment came to his face. Kitty was weeping and
Sir Walter was pleading with her, and so strange was Sir Walter's voice,
so strange what he was saying to Kitty, that all the strangeness of the
day found now its culminating moment.

He walked on, slowly, unwillingly, helplessly, walked on, as he now
knew, into some far other form of suffering than any that had been
foreseen by him that afternoon.

A rustic seat ran round the summer-house. On the side most hidden he
sank down. He did not choose the hidden side. He had no feeling of will
or choice; had they come out upon him he would have looked at them with
the same bewildered eyes. But, dully, he felt that he must
know,--know,--why Kitty was unhappy.

Sunken on the seat, among the traveller's-joy, exhausted, yet alert, his
head dizzy and his heart stilled, as it were, to listen, it was this
amazement and curiosity that Holland felt rather than anger, jealousy,
or grief.

Kitty was unhappy; Sir Walter loved her, and she loved Sir Walter. Sir
Walter was imploring her to come away with him. "But you do love me,"
was the phrase that he repeated again and again, the strong protest of
fact against her refusal.

The dizziness lifting, the heart beating more normally, Holland knew
more. Kitty was unhappy and loved Sir Walter, but, deeper than that, was
the truth that she was happy in her knowledge of his love, deeper than
that--though this depth was of thankfulness in her husband's heart--was
the truth that the love was as yet a beautiful pastime; there was joy
for her in her own sadness, drama in her pain; she was a child with a
strange toy in her hand; it charmed her and she had not learned to dread
it.

Her husband's comprehension of her, of her childishness, her fluidity,
her weakness, actually touched with respect his comprehension of Sir
Walter; for Sir Walter's strength was reverent, even in his recklessness
there was dignity. Holland knew that he spoke the truth when he said to
Kitty that she might trust him for life.

It was the real thing with Sir Walter. With Kitty the real thing could
be little more than the response to reality in others. There was the
danger that her husband steadied himself t