a sort of
troubled hatred in her face.

"You mean----" begins he, hoarsely.

"One thing--one thing only," feverishly--"that I hope I shall never see
you again!"

CHAPTER XLVIII.

"When a man hath once forfeited the reputation of his sincerity he
is set fast, and nothing will then serve his turn, neither truth
nor falsehood."

When he is gone Joyce draws a deep breath. For a moment it seems to her
that it is all over--a disagreeable task performed, and then suddenly a
reaction sets in. The scene gone through has tried her more than she
knows, and without warning now she finds she is crying bitterly.

How horrible it all had been. How detestable he had looked--not so much
when offering her his hand (as for his heart--pah!) as when he had given
way to his weak exhibition of feeling and had knelt at her feet,
throwing himself on her mercy. She placed her hands over her eyes when
she thought of that. Oh! she wished he hadn't done it!

She is still crying softly--not now for Beauclerk's behavior, but for
certain past beliefs--when a knock at the door warns her that another
visitor is coming. She has not had time or sufficient presence of mind
to tell a servant that she is not at home, when Miss Maliphant is
ushered in by the parlor maid.

"I thought I'd come down and have a chat with you about last night," she
begins in her usual loud tones, and with an assumption of easiness that
is belied by the keen and searching glance she directs at Joyce.

"I'm so glad," says Joyce, telling her little lie as bravely as she can,
while trying to conceal her red eyelids from Miss Maliphant's astute
gaze by pretending to rearrange a cushion that has fallen from one of
the lounges.

"Are you?" says her visitor, drily. "Seems to me I've come at the wrong
moment. Shall I go away?"

"Go! No," says Joyce, reddening, and frowning a little. "Why should
you?"

"Well, you've been crying," says Miss Maliphant, in her terribly
downright way. "I hate people when I've been crying; but then it makes
me a fright, and it only makes you a little less pretty. I suppose I
mustn't ask what it is all about?"

"If you did I don't believe I could tell you," says Joyce, laughing
rather unsteadily. "I was merely thinking, and it is the simplest thing
in the world to feel silly now and then."

"Thinking? Of Mr. Beauclerk?" asks Miss Maliphant, promptly, and without
the slightest idea of hesitation. "I saw him leaving this a