which could still speak
through her actions. The mysteries of the soul still pursued their
secret courses within her, like far-off subterranean streams. The
essential part of her remained as it had been. Only a little outside bit
of a framework had been twisted awry. Could that matter very much? Had
she not perhaps been morbid in her despair?

She determined to take courage. She told herself that if she allowed
this dreadful, invading humbleness way in her she would lose all power
to dominate another by showing that she had ceased to dominate herself.
If she met Robin in fear and trembling she would actually teach him to
despise her. If she showed that she thought herself changed,
horrible, he would inevitably catch her thought and turn it to her own
destruction. Men despise those who despise themselves. She knew that,
and she argued with herself, fought with herself. If Robin loved the
angel; surely he could still love. For if there were an angel within
her it had not been harmed. And she leaned on the stone wall and prayed
again while the roses touched her altered face.

It seemed to her then that courage was sent to her. She felt less
terrified of what was before her, as if something had risen up within
her upon which she could lean, as if her soul began to support the
trembling, craven thing that would betray her, began to teach it how to
be still.

She did not feel happy, but she felt less desperately miserable than she
had felt since the accident.

After _dejeuner_ she walked again in the garden. As the time drew near
for Robin to arrive, the dreadful feverish anxiety of the early morning
awoke again within her. She had not conquered herself. Again the thought
of suicide came upon her, and she felt that her life or death were in
the hands of this man whom yet she did not love. They were in his hands
because he was a human being and she was one. There are straits in
which the child of life, whom the invisible hand that is extended in
a religion has not yet found, must find in the darkness a human hand
stretched out to it or sink down in utter terror and perhaps perish.
Lady Holme was in such a strait. She knew it. She said to herself quite
plainly that if Robin failed to stretch out his hand to her she could
not go on living. It was clear to her that her life or death depended
upon whether he remained true to what he had said was his ideal, or
whether he proved false to it and showed himself such a man as Frit