d dishonour. When the debts were paid
off, and the poverty reduced and the honour redeemed, it would be time
to re-consider the understanding. But, as it was just possible that
Horace, if not exactly fascinated by her debts and all the rest of it,
might feel that these very things bound him, challenged him in some
sort to protection, Lucia withdrew herself from the reach of the
chivalrous delivering arm. She took her stand, not quite outside the
circle of the cousinly relation, but on the uttermost fringe and verge
of it, where she entered more and more into her own possession. They
met; they wrote long letters to each other all about art and
literature and philosophy, those ancient unimpassioned themes; for, if
Lucia assumed nothing herself she allowed Horace to assume that
whatever interested him must necessarily interest her. In short,
perceiving the horrible situation in which poor Horace had been left
by that premature understanding, she did everything she could to help
him out of it.

And she succeeded beyond her own or Horace's expectation.

After three years' hard work, when all the debts were paid, and she
was independent, Lucia thought she might now trust herself to stay
with Horace in his house at Hampstead. She had stayed there already
with Edith when Horace was away, but that was different. And at first
all was well; that is to say, there was no anxiety and no uncertainty.
The calm and successful critic of _The Museion_ knew his own mind; and
Lucia said to herself that she knew hers. The understanding between
them was perfect now. They were simply first cousins; each was the
other's best friend; and they could never be anything else. She stood
very much nearer to the heart of the circle, in a place where it was
warm and comfortable and safe. If Horace could only have let her stay
there, all would have been well still. But a mature Lucia, a Lucia
entirely self-possessed, calm and successful, too, in her lesser way;
a Lucia without any drawbacks, and almost to his mind as uncertain as
himself; a Lucia who might be carried off any day before his eyes by
some one of the many brilliant young men whom it was impossible not to
introduce to her, proved fatally disturbing to Horace Jewdwine. And it
was then that the anxiety and uncertainty began.

They were at their height in the sixth year, when Lucia broke down and
came to Hampstead to recover. Fate (not Lucia, of course; you could
not think such things about L