!"

She did not hear, or affected not to. She turned the handle of the door,
but hesitated for a moment. She looked back at him, contempt in her
gaze.

"You are ungenerous," he said again. He had not meant to say it; he had
to say something, and it seemed to him that her anger against him was
almost unreasonable.

She made no answer; the door closed on her, and he was left to try and
collect his thoughts.

And he had not even apologised, he reflected now. She had not given him
an opportunity to.

Pacing the room, Hugh decided what he would do. He would give her time
to cool down, for her wrath to evaporate, then he would seek her out,
and tell her as much as he could--tell her that the secret was not
entirely his own. He would appeal to the generosity that he had told her
she did not possess.

"Hugh!"

"Eh?" He started.

"What does this mean? You don't mean to tell me, Hugh, that all my
efforts have gone for nothing?"

Lady Linden had sailed into the room; she was angry, she quivered with
rage.

"I take an immense amount of trouble to bring two foolish young people
together again, and--and this is the result!"

"What's the result?"

"She has gone!"

"Oh!"

"Did you know she had gone?"

"No, I knew nothing at all about her."

"Well, she has. She left the house twenty minutes ago. I've sent
Chepstow after her in the car; he is to ask her to return."

"I don't suppose she will," Hugh said, remembering the very firm look
about Miss Joan Meredyth's mouth.

"And I planned the reconciliation, I made sure that once you came face
to face it would be all right. Hugh, there is more behind all this than
meets the eye!"

"That's it," he said, "a great deal more! No third person can interfere
with any hope of success."

"And you," she said, "can let a girl like that, your own wife, go out of
your life and make no effort to detain her!"

He nodded.

"For two pins," said Lady Linden, "I would box your ears, Hugh Alston."

CHAPTER V

"PERHAPS I SHALL GO BACK"

Perhaps she was over-sensitive and a little unreasonable, but she would
not admit it. She had been insulted by a man who had used her name
lightly, who had proclaimed that he was her husband, a man who was a
complete stranger to her. She had heard of him before from Marjorie
Linden, when they were at school together.

Marjorie had spoken of this man in effusive admiration. Joan's lips
curled with scorn. She did not question her own an