"Why not?" she murmured, dropping her eyes. "I am tired of my life. What
you owed me then you owe me now. Why should it be too late? I am not an
old woman yet, nor are you an old man, and I am weary of being alone."

Mannering walked to the window. His hand went to his forehead. It was
damp and cold. He was afraid! If she were in earnest! And she spoke like
a woman who knew her mind. She was always, he remembered, a creature of
caprice. If she were really in earnest!

"We have drifted too far apart, Blanche," he said, making an effort to
face the situation. "Years ago this might have been possible. To-day it
would be a dismal failure. My ways are not yours. The life I lead would
bore you to death."

"There is no reason why you should not alter it," she answered, calmly.
"In fact, I should wish you to. Blakely all the year round would be an
impossibility. You could come and live in London."

He looked at her fixedly.

"Have you forgotten?" he asked.

She covered her face with her hands for a moment. If indeed she really
felt any emotion it passed quickly away, for when she looked up again
there were no traces left.

"I have forgotten nothing," she declared, defiantly. "Only the horror and
fear of it all has passed away. I don't see why I should suffer all my
life. In fact, I don't mean to. I don't want to be a miserable, lonely