Marie had gone out for the day! He knew only too well what that meant--that she had already left home forever, to join her life with his.

It was impossible to stop her now. He would have to go and meet her, as they had arranged last night.

He had told her to meet him at a little inn on the Oxford road. He had arranged to drive the car down in the evening and take her away!

Last night it had sounded like sense! But this morning ...

Madness!--utter madness!

Twice during the morning he rang Chris again, but each time he was still out, and finally Feathers wrote to him.

He sent the note by a boy who lived in the house, and went round to the garage to fetch his car.

If Marie had gone to the inn earlier than he had told her, there was still time to tell her the truth and take her back home.

It was afternoon then; an unusually hot day for September, with a curiously humid feeling in the air.

Feathers drove like a man in a dream. Everything seemed so unreal and impossible. He wondered what the end of it all would be.

It was only four o'clock when he reached the inn, but Marie was not there. He supposed he could hardly have expected her to be, seeing that he had not told her to meet him until eight that evening.

He remembered how he had calculated that it would be dark and that they could make their escape under cover of the friendly night. His whole soul writhed now as he thought of it. The shame of what he had done overwhelmed him.

He never knew how he got through the long hours. He could not keep still for a moment. In and out he wandered, looking up and down the long road by which she must come.

It seemed to get dark early. The river flowed close to the inn, and a curious gray mist rose from the fields and the water till almost a fog lay over the countryside.

Feathers suffered the tortures of the d.a.m.ned. His heart was sick with mingled dread and longing. One moment he was praying that she would not come, that at the last moment she would change her mind and not dare to face it, and the next his soul was in agony lest he should never see her again. A thousand times he went into the quiet little inn parlor and looked at the clock. It was five minutes to eight, and he had told Chris to be there at half-past seven! It had seemed the only way! If Chris came, between them they could tell her the whole story, but the clock struck the hour and there was no sign of Chris, no sign of Marie.

Feathers went to the door again. He was shaking as if with ague and his lips were like ice.

Had anything happened to her? He thought he should go mad with dread. He paced back into the inn again. Perhaps the clock was wrong--perhaps ...

"Mr. Dakers," said a timid voice, and he turned slowly to find Marie beside him.

CHAPTER XXII

"I am old and very tired, though to strangers I am young; Life was just a sporting gamble, but for me the game is done; It was worth it, and I'm scoffing now the reckoning has come; That's the worst of too much loving-- Hurts like Hades when it's done."

FEATHERS' relief was so great that at first he could not speak, and she went on tremulously: "I've been here ever so long, walking up and down the road." She cast a timid glance behind her. "I saw you"--she went on almost whispering. "But I was afraid. I thought-- oh, I thought so many dreadful things." He could see how she was trembling, and he took her hand into a warm clasp. "Oh, I am so glad to be with you," she said pa.s.sionately.

He drew her into the parlor, closing the door. Though the evening was warm a fire burned in the old-fashioned open grate, its flames throwing fantastic shadows on walls and low ceiling.

Feathers put Marie into a chair, and stood beside her.

"There is nothing to be afraid of," he said gently. "You are quite safe with me"--but he looked away from her as he spoke, and the devil of desire rose again in his heart, turning his blood to fire, and forcing his pulse to racing speed. In that moment he fought the hardest battle of his life, as he stood there, her soft fingers clinging to his, in the intimacy of the firelit room, and with the silent country lying all around them outside.

He was an ugly man, with a hulking, grotesque body, but there was something of the angel in his eyes when presently he looked down at the girl's bowed head.

"Marie--will you answer me one question?"

She nodded, her lips were trembling too much to speak.

"Are you sure--can you tell me truthfully, with all your heart and soul, that you wish to come away with me to-night? that you know it is for your complete happiness?--that you have not one single fear, or regret?"

She nodded again, not looking at him.

"When you left me--last night," he insisted gently, "were you still quite happy?--perfectly happy?"

Silence now, then suddenly she looked up.

"Were you?" she whispered.

"No."

He never knew how he forced the word to his lips. The old longing was rending his heart, the old tempting whispers torturing him.

Marie hid her face in her shaking hands.

Feathers sat down beside her. He put an arm round her shrinking figure as a big brother might have done, and his voice when he spoke was infinitely gentle.

"Last night was a dream," he said. "Let us forget it. I alone am to blame. No, no--let me go on," as she would have spoken. "No matter how much we might--I might love you, there are other things that count even more in the sum total of happiness--things I should be powerless to give you, and so ... so we must forget ... last night ... and go back ... . But you know that, Marie--without my telling you."

She looked up at him then, and suddenly she broke out wildly:

"It isn't that I don't love you--that I didn't mean it when I said I loved you. Oh, don't think that--don't think that!"

Feathers rose abruptly. He walked away from her, and his face was white, as Marie went on hopelessly.

"I can't explain myself--I don't understand myself. I only know that I've never been so happy in all my life as--as I was last night when--when you kissed me--I shall always remember it, always-- It's too late to hope that I shall ever be happy with ... with Chris--even if--if I wanted to; but--but he is my husband, and so ..." She half turned, flinging despairing arms towards him. "Oh, help me, please help me," she said sobbing.

Feathers came back to her, knelt down beside her, and took both her hands in his. The pallor had not left his face, but it was wonderful in its tenderness and his voice was infinitely gentle when he spoke.

"Chris came to my rooms last night--after ... after you had gone." She looked up with terrified eyes.

"Chris!"

"Yes." Feathers drew a hard breath. "Marie, you know that ...

that he loves you, too?"

"Loves me!" she laughed harshly. "When he married me for my money-- when he left me alone all those weeks! If it hadn't been for you ..." She pushed his arm away and rose to her feet. "Oh, I don't want to talk about him. I never wish to see him any more."

Feathers stood up, so that his big figure was between her and the door.