not see any relief from this anxiety except repayment, and repayment
seemed impossible. The raising of twenty-five pounds was a task
altogether beyond her powers. Her birthday was four months away, and
that, at its extremist point, might give her another five pounds.

The thing rankled in her mind night and day. She would wake in the night
to repeat her bitter cry: "Oh, why did I burn those notes?"

It added greatly to the annoyance of the situation that she had twice
seen Ramage in the Avenue since her return to the shelter of her
father's roof. He had saluted her with elaborate civility, his eyes
distended with indecipherable meanings.

She felt she was bound in honor to tell the whole affair to Manning
sooner or later. Indeed, it seemed inevitable that she must clear it up
with his assistance, or not at all. And when Manning was not about
the thing seemed simple enough. She would compose extremely lucid and
honorable explanations. But when it came to broaching them, it proved to
be much more difficult than she had supposed.

They went down the great staircase of the building, and, while she
sought in her mind for a beginning, he broke into appreciation of her
simple dress and self-congratulations upon their engagement.

"It makes me feel," he said, "that nothing is impossible--to have you
here beside me. I said, that day at Surbiton, 'There's many good things
in life, but there's only one best, and that's the wild-haired girl
who's pulling away at that oar. I will make her my Grail, and some day,
perhaps, if God wills, she shall become my wife!'"