have the sea air. For God's sake, don't let us quarrel! I have enough
to try me without that." She closed the door on herself and her
daughter, and left her lord and master standing face to face with the
wreck of his own outraged authority.

What further progress was made by the domestic revolt, when the bedroom
candles were lit, and the hour of retirement had arrived with the
night, is naturally involved in mystery. This alone is certain: On the
next morning, the luggage was packed, and the cab was called to the
door. Mrs. Ronald spoke her parting words to her husband in private.

"I hope I have not expressed myself too strongly about taking Emma to
the seaside," she said, in gentle pleading tones. "I am anxious about
our girl's health. If I have offended you--without meaning it, God
knows!--say you forgive me before I go. I have tried honestly, dear, to
be a good wife to you. And you have always trusted me, haven't you? And
you trust me still?"

She took his lean cold hand, and pressed it fervently: her eyes rested
on him with a strange mixture of timidity and anxiety. Still in the
prime of her life, she preserved the personal attractions--the fair
calm refined face, the natural grace of look and movement--which had
made her marriage to a man old enough to be her father a cause of angry
astonishment among all her friends. In the agitation that now possessed
her, her colour rose, her eyes brightened; she looked for the moment
almost young enough to be Emma's sister. Her husband opened his hard
old eyes in surly bewilderment. "Why need you make this fuss?" he
asked. "I don't understand you." Mrs. Ronald shrank at those words as
if he had struck her. She kissed him in silence, and joined her
daughter in the cab.