Jane.

"No; I can't think. I'm too tired, and my head's hot. But if I go away
you'll understand why I did it?"

"Kitty"--Jane whispered it--"you won't go back?"

"No. I won't go back. You won't have to think that of me."

She had not looked at Jane as they talked. Now she turned to her with
eyes of anguish and appeal.

"Janey--think. I've been wicked for years and years. I've only been good
for one moment. One moment--when I gave Robert up. Do you think it'll
count?"

"I think that, in the sight of God, such moments last forever."

"And that's what you'll think of me by?"

She lifted up her face, haggard and white, flame-spotted where her tears
had scorched it. Jane kissed it.

"Do you mind kissing me?"

"My dear, my dear," said Jane, and she drew her closer.

There was a sound of footsteps in the passage. Kitty drew back and
listened.

"Where's Robert?"

"Upstairs with the children."

"They'll be asleep by this time, won't they?"

"Fast asleep."

The footsteps came again, approaching the door. They paused outside it a
moment and turned back.

"Do you hear that?" said Kitty. "It's Wilfrid Marston walking up and
down. He wants to get hold of me. I think he's mad about me. He asked me
to marry him just now, and I wouldn't. He thinks I didn't mean it, and
he's coming back for his answer. But I'll tell you what I'm going to do.
I shall go out quietly by the window and slip away, and he won't find
me. I want you to be here when he comes, and tell him that he can't see
me. Would you mind doing that?"

"No."

"You'll stay here all the time, and you won't let him go out and look
for me?"

"Yes."

Kitty listened again for the footsteps.

"He's still there," she whispered.

"And you'll go to bed, Kitty?"

"Yes; of course I will."

She went out through the window on to the veranda, and so on into the
garden.

It was cool out there and unutterably peaceful, with a tender, lucid
twilight on the bare grass of the lawn; on the sea beyond it, and on the
white gravel path by the low wall between. She saw it, the world that
had held her and Robert, that, holding them, had taken on the ten days'
splendour of their passion. It stood, divinely still in the perishing
violet light, a world withdrawn and unsubstantial, yet piercingly,
intolerably near.

Indoors Jane waited. It was not yet the half-hour. She waited till the
clock struck and Marston came for his answer.

He looked round the room, and his