mpt had dispelled his one motive for
restraint? Her whole future might hinge on her way of answering him: she
had to stop and consider that, in the stress of her other anxieties, as a
breathless fugitive may have to pause at the cross-roads and try to
decide coolly which turn to take.

"You are quite right, Mr. Rosedale. I HAVE had bothers; and I am grateful
to you for wanting to relieve me of them. It is not always easy to be
quite independent and self-respecting when one is poor and lives among
rich people; I have been careless about money, and have worried about my
bills. But I should be selfish and ungrateful if I made that a reason for
accepting all you offer, with no better return to make than the desire to
be free from my anxieties. You must give me time--time to think of your
kindness--and of what I could give you in return for it----"

She held out her hand with a charming gesture in which dismissal was
shorn of its rigour. Its hint of future leniency made Rosedale rise in
obedience to it, a little flushed with his unhoped-for success, and
disciplined by the tradition of his blood to accept what was conceded,
without undue haste to press for more. Something in his prompt
acquiescence frightened her; she felt behind it the stored force of a
patience that might subdue the strongest will. But at least they had
parted amicably, and he was out of the house without meeting
Selden--Selden, whose continued absence now smote her with a new alarm.
Rosedale had remained over an hour, and she understood that it was now
too late to hope for Selden. He would write explaining his absence, of
course; there would be a note from him by the late post. But her
confession would have to be postponed; and the chill of the delay settled
heavily on her fagged spirit.

It lay heavier when the postman's last ring brought no note for her, and
she had to go upstairs to a lonely night--a night as grim and sleepless
as her tortured fancy had pictured it to Gerty. She had never learned to
live with her own thoughts, and to be confronted with them through such
hours of lucid misery made the confused wretchedness of her previous
vigil seem easily bearable.

Daylight disbanded the phantom crew, and made it clear to her that she
would hear from Selden before noon; but the day passed without his
writing or coming. Lily remained at home, lunching and dining alone with
her aunt, who complained of flutterings of the heart, and talked icily on
gen