te, the very thing to produce
in his mind a conviction of her resentment?

Hereupon came another paroxysm of tearful misery. It was intensified by
a thought she had half consciously been repressing ever since the
conversation with her brother. Was it true that Miss Moxey had had it
in her power to strip Godwin of a disguise? What, then, were the
relations existing between him and that strangely impressive woman? How
long had they known each other? It was now all but certain that a
strong intellectual sympathy united their minds--and perhaps there had
been something more.

She turned her face upon the pillow and moaned.

CHAPTER IV

And from the Moxeys Buckland had derived his information. What was it
he said--something about 'an odd look' on Miss Moxey's face when that
friend of theirs talked of Peak? Might not such a look signify a
conflict between the temptation to injure and the desire to screen?

Sidwell constructed a complete romance. Ignorance of the past of both
persons concerned allowed her imagination free play. There was no limit
to the possibilities of self-torment.

The desire to see Godwin took such hold upon her, that she had already
begun to think over the wording of another note to be sent to him the
first thing in the morning. His reply had been insufficient: simple
justice required that she should hear him in his own defence before
parting with him for ever. If she kept silence, he would always
remember her with bitterness, and this would make her life-long sorrow
harder to bear. Sidwell was one of those few women whose love, never
demonstrative, never exigent, only declares itself in all its profound
significance when it is called upon to pardon. What was likely to be
the issue of a meeting with Godwin she could not foresee. It seemed all
but impossible for their intercourse to continue, and their coming face
to face might result in nothing but distress to both, better avoided;
yet judgment yielded to emotion. Yesterday--only yesterday--she had
yielded herself to the joy of loving, and before her consciousness had
had time to make itself familiar with its new realm, before her eyes
had grown accustomed to the light suddenly shed about her, she was
bidden to think of what had happened as only a dream. Her heart refused
to make surrender of its hope. Though it could be held only by an
encouragement of recognised illusion, she preferred to dream yet a
little longer. Above all, she must taste