babe itself. Fair and sweet surely. Yet why, if innocent, that nervous
start at sight of him--that frightened look in the blue eyes. The
nurse stood at a distance, but he did not heed her.

"A summons from Powyss Place," he said; "the poor old squire has had a
fit of apoplexy. This is the second within the year, and may prove
fatal. I must go at once. It is not likely I shall return to-night."

She looked at him, startled by his deadly paleness; but then, perhaps,
the summons accounted for that. She murmured her regrets, then bent
again over her baby.

"You have nothing to say to me, Ethel, before I go?" he said, looking
at her steadily.

She half-lifted her head, the words half-rose to her lips. She glanced
at the distant nurse, who was still busy in the room, glanced at her
husband's pale set face, and they died away again. Why detain him now
in his haste and trouble? Why rouse his rage against Juan Catheron at
this inopportune time? No, she would wait until to-morrow--nothing
could be done now; then she would reveal that intrusion in the grounds.

"I have nothing to say, except good-by. I hope poor Mr. Powyss may not
be so ill as you fear."

He turned away--a tumult of jealous rage within him. A deliberate lie
he thought it; there could be no doubt of her guilt now. And yet,
insanely inconsistent as it seems, he had never loved her more
passionately than in that hour.