But it died out, and he thought of the return to London, to Beatrice,
and the children. How would it be? Beatrice, with her furious dark eyes,
and her black hair loosely knotted back, came to his mind as she had
been the previous day, flaring with temper when he said to her:

'I shall be going away tomorrow for a few days' holiday.'

She asked for detail, some of which he gave. Then, dissatisfied and
inflamed, she broke forth in her suspicion and her abuse, and her
contempt, while two large-eyed children stood listening by. Siegmund
hated his wife for drawing on him the grave, cold looks of condemnation
from his children.

Something he had said touched Beatrice. She came of good family, had
been brought up like a lady, educated in a convent school in France. He
evoked her old pride. She drew herself up with dignity, and called the
children away. He wondered if he could bear a repetition of that
degradation. It bled him of his courage and self-respect.

In the morning Beatrice was disturbed by the sharp sneck of the hall
door. Immediately awake, she heard his quick, firm step hastening down
the gravel path. In her impotence, discarded like a worn out object, she
lay for the moment stiff with bitterness.

'I am nothing, I am nothing,' she said to herself. She lay quite rigid
for a time.

There was no sound anywhere. The morning sunlight pierced vividly
through the slits of the blind. Beatrice lay rocking herself, breathing
hard, her finger-nails pressing into her palm. Then came the sound of a