oy was deep, and that it was in such moments
of power over an emotion she could rouse yet dominate that she had her
keenest sense of it.

"I can't help it," said Sir Walter. "I shall always want you to come
away with me."

"Good-bye:--for to-day."

"It's you who are cruel."

At that, silence following, Holland knew that Kitty's quiet tears fell
again.

Sir Walter was subjugated. He pleaded for pardon; promised not to
torment her--to try not to torment her. A trysting-place was fixed on
for next day and Holland felt another chill of fear at Kitty's swift
resource and craft in planning it. The child knew how to plot and lie.
It thought itself nobly justified, no doubt, and that its fidelity to
duty gave it the right to every liberty of conscience. And before Sir
Walter went there was a moment of relenting that showed how near was the
joy of yielding to the joy of ruthlessness, "For this once,--for this
once only--" Kitty murmured. And Holland knew that Sir Walter held her
in his arms and kissed her.

After his departure Kitty sat on for some moments in the summer-house.
She sighed deeply once or twice and Holland fancied, from her light
movements, that she had leaned her arms on the table and rested her head
on them. He heard presently, that she was softly saying a prayer, and at
the sound, tears filled his eyes. Then, rising, she collected her basket
of flowers, her parasol, her books, and walked away with slow steps
along the path leading to the house.

CHAPTER II

Two facts stood clear before Holland's eyes. He had been culpably blind
and Kitty was in danger. He asked himself if he had not been culpably
selfish too, for Kitty's summing up of his attitude towards her would
have hurt had he not been beyond such hurts; but, looking back, he could
not see that he had ever pushed Kitty aside nor relegated her to the
place of plaything. No; the ship of his romance, all its sails set to
fairest, sweetest hopes, had been well-ballasted by the most serious,
most generous of modern theories as to the right relations of man and
wife. And the shock and disillusion had been to find, day by day, that
it was, so to speak, only the sails that Kitty cared for. The cargo, the
purpose of their voyage, left her prettily, vaguely indifferent. Again
and again, he remembered, it had been as if he had led her down into the
busy heart of the ship, explained the chart to her, pointed out all the
interesting wares. Kitty had s