d begged for forgiveness, Milly in all her soft, humorous reproaches
daring now to tease and rally, had yet the chill of a new discovery to
reckon with. A weight seemed to have come upon her as she realised how
much Christina cared. It was as if Christina had confessed that she
cared so much more than she, Milly, could ever do. She had not before
thought of their friendship as a responsibility. It was too dear, and
silly and pathetic in Christina, but it seemed to manacle her.

She must be very careful to like no Joans too much in the future.
Christina protested passionately that she must talk to Joan and love
Joan--any number of Joans, young or old, male or female, as much as
before, more than before, since now her folly was dissipated by
confession; but Milly in her heart knew better than to believe her. She
filled Christina's life completely, to the exclusion of any other deep
affection, and Christina could never be happy unless her friend's life
were equally undivided.

CHAPTER II

DICK

Four years passed, and during them Dick Quentyn had wandered about the
world, not at all disconsolately. He spent several seasons with friends
in India; he went to Canada and to Japan; when he came home he filled
his time largely with shooting and hunting.

It was almost as a guest that, in the country and in his own house, he
passed a few weeks with Milly and Christina and entirely as a guest that
he dined now and then with them in London.

It was a rather ludicrous situation, but he did not seem depressed or
abashed by it. Christina always felt that by some boyish intuition he
recognized in her a friendly sympathy, a sympathy which he must
certainly see as terribly detached, since it was she who had now fixed
definitely Milly's removal from his life, made it permanent and given it
a meaning. But it was a sympathy very friendly, even slightly humorous.
He would catch her dark eyes sometimes as he sat, a guest at her
dinner-table--(he never took Milly in, all the negations of married life
were still his)--and in them he saw and responded to an almost
affectionate playfulness. He evidently saw the joke and it amused him.
Christina often reflected that Dick was a dear, in all his
impossibility, and that Milly was not nearly nice enough to him. But
Milly was nicer than she had been; the new effectiveness and happiness
of her own life made it less of an effort to be so. From her illumined
temple she smiled at him, a smile