y from her face.
He believed that? He imagined that she was fighting just for a name, a
position in the world? She stared at him in amazement, and forced herself
to understand. Since he himself had cared for her enough to remain
unmarried, since the knowledge of the mistake which he had made had grown
more bitter with each year, he had fallen easily into that other error
that she had never ceased to care too.

"We'll make something of our lives, never fear," he was saying. "But to
marry this man for his position, and he not knowing--oh, my dear, I know
how you are driven--but it won't do! It won't do!"

She stood in silence for a little while. One by one he had torn her
defences down. She could hardly bear the gentleness upon his face and
she turned away from him and sat down upon a chair a little way off.

"Stand there, Henry," she said. A strange composure had succeeded her
agitation. "I must tell you something more which I had meant to hide
from you--the last thing which I have kept back. It will hurt you, I
am afraid."

There came a change upon Thresk's face. He was steeling himself to
meet a blow.

"Go on."

"It isn't because of his position that I cling to Dick. I want him to
keep that--yes--for his sake. I don't want him to lose more by marrying
me than he needs must"; and comprehension burst upon Henry Thresk.

"You care for him then! You really care for him?"

"So much," she answered, "that if I lost him now I should lose all the
world. You and I can't go back to where we stood nine years ago. You had
your chance then, Henry, if you had wished to take it. But you didn't
wish it, and that sort of chance doesn't often come again. Others like
it--yes. But not quite the same one. I am sorry. But you must believe me.
If I lost Dick I should lose all the world."

So far she had spoken very deliberately, but now her voice faltered.

"That is my one poor excuse."

The unexpected word roused Thresk to inquiry.

"Excuse?" he asked, and with her eyes fixed in fear upon him she
continued:

"Yes. I meant Dick to marry me publicly. But I saw that his father shrank
from the marriage. I grew afraid. I told Dick of my fears. He banished
them. I let him banish them."

"What do you mean?" Thresk asked.

"We were married privately in London five days ago."

Thresk uttered a low cry and in a moment Stella was at his side, all her
composure gone.

"Oh, I know that it was wrong. But I was being hunted. They were