is plenty of room."
He had not taken to either Delaval Stirling or Chris Harford, and
thought a change of company would not come amiss. They had ignored him,
and should pay for it.

Hector made his way joyfully to the back, and, entering, was greeted
affably by his host, so the other two men got up to leave to make room
for him.

He sat down behind Theodora, and Mrs. Devlyn saw it would be wiser to
conciliate Josiah by her interested conversation.

She hoped to make a good thing out of this millionaire and his unknown
wife, and it would not do to ruffle him at this stage of the affair.

Theodora hardly turned, thus Hector was obliged to lean quite forward to
speak to her.

"I have seen my sister to-night," he said, "and she wants so much to
meet you. I said perhaps she would find you to-morrow. Will you be at
home in the afternoon any time?"

"I expect so," replied Theodora. She was longing to face him, to ask him
if it was true he was going to marry that large, pink-faced young woman
opposite, who was now staring down upon them with fixed opera-glasses;
but she felt frozen, and her voice was a frozen voice.

Hector became more and more unhappy. He tried several subjects. He told
her the last news of her father and Mrs. McBride. She answered them all
with the same politeness, until, maddened beyond bearing, he leaned
still farther forward and whispered in her ear:

"For God's sake, what is it? What have I done?"

"Nothing," said Theodora. What right had she to ask him any question,
when for these seven nights and days since they had parted she had been
disciplining herself not to think of him in any way? She must never let
him know it could matter to her now.

"Nothing? Then why are you so changed? Ah, how it hurts!" he whispered,
passionately. And she turned and looked at him, and he saw that her
beautiful eyes were no longer those pure depths of blue sky in which he
could read love and faith, but were full of mist, as of a curtain
between them.

He put his hand up to touch the little gold case he carried always now
in his waistcoat-pocket, which contained her letter. He wanted to assure
himself it was there, and she had written it--and it was not all a
dream.

Theodora's tender heart was wrung by the passionate distress in his
eyes.

"Is that your mother over there you were with?" she asked, more gently.
"How beautiful she is!"

"Yes," he said, "my mother and Morella Winmarleigh, whom the world in