was satisfied that her preoccupation with the Grosvenor Place
household all arose out of womanly sympathy on her part; that Lady
Lakeden's tragic widowhood had touched the depths of her imagination.

Poor Alice! How simple and trusting her surface reading of the facts!
How ignorant of the brutal complications, as grotesque as incredible, in
which Nature often wrapped up human unhappiness!

What a terrible tangle it was for them all! Were he free now, how gladly
would his princess have placed her hand in his! In the old days the
possible marriage of the brilliant girl had been hedged around with
extraordinary limitations--to which he too had bowed as to something in
the order of nature. But, as a widow, she would naturally be expected to
please herself when matrimonially inclined. By common social
understanding, even the noblest and richest of widows may permit herself
a considerable latitude of choice, and no word of criticism can lie
against her unless she has travelled rather far out of the conventional
grooves. A marriage between him and Lady Betty now might raise a flicker
of interest beyond what was usual--considering his notorious
poverty--but it could call down nobody's censure.

But all this, alas! was but an idle speculation now. The time sped; the
earl bade him goodbye; and he realised that the end was fast
approaching. The few days that remained to him of Lady Betty's
companionship became trebly precious, to be counted with despair! Though
only an hour or two out of the twenty-four was spent in her society, his
whole heart and mind, his whole life, were concentrated there. Each day
he brought her a bunch of lilies of the valley, which she fixed in her
bosom and insisted he must include in the picture. And during the
enchanted time they were together, they talked freely and in perfect
trust. It was more than a friendship--more than an exchange of
confidences; it was more than the intimacy of a soul with itself--for
that is not always honest even at its most courageous moments. In this
free, splendid realm of communion with her, he stood up in all his
manhood: rising to that simple truth which is yet of the heavens and the
spaces; measuring himself against great standards; seeing and regretting
his egotisms, vanities, self-deceptions; valuing himself humbly. The
depths of Lady Betty's sympathy were indeed profound. She could enter
into his life, appreciate motives barely realised by himself, and, with
charmi