"Go, then, and leave me for this time," she besought him. But still he
could not go, and still the Lady Catharine could not bid him more
sternly to depart. Youth--youth, and love, and fate were in that room;
and these would have their way.

The beseeching gaze of an eye singular in its power rested on the girl,
a gaze filled with all the strange, half mandatory pleading of youth and
yearning. Once more there came a shift in the tidal currents of the
woman's heart. The Lady Catharine slowly became conscious of a delicious
helplessness, of a sinking and yielding which she could not resist. Her
head lost power to be erect. It slipped forward on a shoulder waiting as
by right. Her breath came in soft measure, and unconsciously a hand was
raised to touch the cheek pressed down to hers. John Law kissed her once
upon the lips. Suddenly, without plan--in spite of all plan--the seal of
a strange fate was set forever on her life!

For a long moment they stood thus, until at length she raised a face
pale and sharp, and pushed back against his breast a hand that trembled.

"'Tis wondrous strange," she whispered.

"Ask nothing," said John Law, "fear nothing. Only believe, as I
believe."

Neither John Law nor the Lady Catharine Knollys saw what was passing
just without the room. They did not see the set face which looked down
from the stairway. Through the open door Mary Connynge could see the
young man as he stepped out of the door, could see the conduct of the
girl now left alone in the drawing-room. She saw the Lady Catharine sink