"You wouldn't object to my remaining a few days more?" He had reached the
doorway.

"What have I to do with your staying?" she asked.

"Everything," he answered--and was gone.

She stood still. The feeling that possessed her now was rebellion, and
akin to hate.

Her conduct, therefore, becomes all the more incomprehensible when we
find her accepting, the next afternoon, his invitation to sail on Mr.
Farnham's yacht, the 'Folly'. It is true that the gods will not exonerate
Mrs. Shorter. That lady, who had been bribed with Alfred Dewing, used her
persuasive powers; she might be likened to a skilful artisan who blew
wonderful rainbow fabrics out of glass without breaking it; she blew the
tender passion into a thousand shapes, and admired every one. Her
criminal culpability consisted in forgetting the fact that it could not
be trusted with children.

Nature seems to delight in contrasts. As though to atone for the fog she
sent a dazzling day out of the northwest, and the summer world was
stained in new colours. The yachts were whiter, the water bluer, the
grass greener; the stern grey rocks themselves flushed with purple. The
wharves were gay, and dark clustering foliage hid an enchanted city as
the Folly glided between dancing buoys. Honora, with a frightened glance
upward at the great sail, caught her breath. And she felt rather than saw
the man beside her guiding her seaward.

A discreet expanse of striped yellow deck separated them from the wicker