A dead silence followed the calm announcement. Then Diana rose. At the
misery, the anguish that could impress so strange and white a look on
Ruth's winsome face, she was smitten with remorse, her incipient
satisfaction dashed. This was her work; the fruit of her scheming. But
it had gone further than she had foreseen; and for all that no result
could better harmonize with her own ambitions and desires, for the
moment - under the first shock of that announcement - she felt guilty
and grew afraid.

"Ruth!" she cried, her voice a whisper of stupefaction. "Oh, I wish I
had come with you!"

"But you couldn't; you were faint." And then - recalling what had
passed - her mind was filled with sudden concern for Diana, even amid
her own sore troubles. "Are you quite yourself again, Diana?" she
inquired.

Diana answered almost fiercely, "I am quite well." And then, with a
change to wistfulness, she added, "Oh, I would I had come with you!"

"Matters had been no different," Ruth assured her. "It was a bargain
Mr. Wilding drove. It was the price I had to pay for Richard's life and
honour." She swallowed hard, and let her hands fall limply to her
sides. "Where is Richard?" she inquired.

It was her aunt who answered her. "He went forth half an hour agone
with Mr. Vallancey and Sir Rowland."

"Sir Rowland had returned, then?" She looked up quickly.