s
regular breathing, opened the eyes she had only pretended to close, and
lay staring into the shadows of the room, in which a nightlight was
burning. Presently she got up softly, put on a dressing-gown, and went
to the fire, which she noiselessly replenished; drawing up a chair, she
sank back into it, her arms folded. The strengthening firelight showed
her small white face, amid the masses of her dark hair.

Her whole being was seething with passionate and revengeful thought. It
was as though with violent straining and wrenching the familiar links
and bulwarks of life were breaking down, and as if amid the wreck of
them she found herself looking at goblin faces beyond, growing gradually
used to them, ceasing to be startled by them, finding in them even a
wild attraction and invitation.

[Illustration: "Her whole being was seething with passionate and
revengeful thought."]

So Roger had lied to her. Instead of a casual ride, involving a meeting
with a few old acquaintances, as he had represented to her, he had been
engaged that day in an assignation with Mrs. Fairmile, arranged
beforehand, and carefully concealed from his wife. Miss Farmer had seen
them coming out of a wood together hand in hand! In the public road,
this!--not even so much respect for appearances as might have dictated
the most elementary reticence and decency. The case was so clear that it
sickened her; she shivered with cold and nausea as she lay there by the
now glowing fire which yet gave her no physical comfort. Probably in the
past their relation had gone much farther than Roger had ever confessed
to his wife. Mrs. Fairmile was a woman who would stick at nothing. And
if Daphne were not already betrayed, she could no longer protect
herself. The issue was certain. Such women as Chloe Fairmile are not to
be baulked of what they desire. Good women cannot fight them on equal
terms. And as to any attempt to keep the affections of a husband who
could behave in such a way to the wife who had given him her youth,
herself, and all the resources and facilities of life, Daphne's whole
being stiffened into mingled anguish and scorn as she renounced the
contest. Knowing himself the traitor that he was, he could yet hold her,
kiss her, murmur tender things to her, allow her to cry upon his breast,
to stammer repentance and humbleness. Cowardly! False! Treacherous! She
flung out her hands, rigid, before her in the darkness, as though for
ever putting him away.