'I expected to see him,' Thyrza replied. 'I knew he was to come in two years. I have waited all the time; and now he has not come. I heard----'

She checked herself, and looked at the trellis at the back of the summer-house. She understood now that it was needful to explain her knowledge.

'You heard, Thyrza----?'

'That night that he was here. I had walked to look at your house. I was going home again when he passed me--he didn't see me--and went into the garden. I couldn't go back at once; I had to sit down and rest. It was on the other side of the leaves.' She pointed. 'I sat down there without knowing he would be here and I should hear him talking to you.

I heard all you said--about the two years. I have been waiting for him to come.'

Mrs. Ormonde could not reply; what words would express what she felt in learning this? Thyrza's eyes were still fixed upon her.

'I want you to tell me where he is, Mrs. Ormonde.'

It was a summons that could not be avoided.

'Sit here, Thyrza. I will tell you. Sit down and let me speak to you.'

'No, no! Tell me now! Why not? Why should I sit down? What is there to say?'

The words were not weakly complaining, but of passionate insistence.

Thyrza believed that Mrs. Ormonde was preparing to elude her, was shaping excuses. Her eyes watched the other's every movement keenly, with fear and hostility. She felt within reach of her desire, yet held back by this woman from attaining it. Every instant of silence heightened the maddening tumult of her heart and brain. She had suffered so terribly since Saturday. It seemed as if her gentleness, her patience, were converted into their opposites, which now ruled her tyrannously.

'Mr. Egremont is not in London,' Mrs. Ormonde said at last. She dreaded the result of any word she might say. She was asking herself whether Walter ought not to be summoned back at once. Was it too late for that?

'Not in London? Then where? You saw him on Saturday?'

'Yes, I saw him.'

'And you would not tell him where I was, Mrs. Ormonde? You spoke like you did that night. You persuaded him not to come to me--when I was waiting. I forgave you for what you said before, but now you have done something that I shall never forgive----'

'Thyrza----'

'There's nothing you can say will make me forgive you! Your kindness to me hasn't been kindness at all. It was all to separate me from him.

What have you told him about me? You have said I don't think of him any more. You made him believe I wasn't fit for him. And now you will refuse to tell me where he is.'

'Thyrza!'

Mrs. Ormonde took the girl's hands forcibly in her own, and held them against her breast. She was pale and overcome with emotion.

'Thyrza, you don't know what you are saying! Do force yourself to be calmer, so that you can listen to me.'

'Don't hold my hands, Mrs. Ormonde! I have loved you, but I can't pretend to, now that you have done this against me. I will listen to you, but how shall I believe what you say? I didn't think one woman could be so cruel to another as you have been to me. You don't know what it means, to wait as I have waited; if you knew, you'd never have done this; you wouldn't have had the heart to do this to me.'

'My poor child, think, think--_how_ could I know that you were waiting?

You forget that you have only just told me your secret for the first time. I have seen you always so full of life and gladness, and how was I to dream of this sudden change?'

Thyrza listened, and, as if imperfectly comprehending, examined the speaker's face in silence.

'I am not the cruel woman you call me,' Mrs. Ormonde went on. 'I had no idea that your happiness depended upon meeting with Mr. Egremont again.'

'You had no idea of that?' Thyrza asked, slowly, wonderingly. 'You say that you didn't know I loved him?'

'Not that you still loved him. Two years ago--I knew it was so then.

But I fancied----'

'You thought I had forgotten all about him? How could you think that?

Is it possible to love any one and forget so soon, and live as if nothing had happened? That cannot be true, Mrs. Ormonde. I know you _wished_ me to forget him. And that is what you told him when you saw him on Saturday! You said I thought no more of him, and that it was better he shouldn't see me! Oh, what right had you to say that? Where is he now? You say you arc not cruel; let me know where I can find him.'

There was but one answer to make, yet Mrs. Ormonde dreaded to utter it.

The girl's state was such that it might be fatal to tell her the truth.

Passion such as this, nursed to this through two years in a heart which could affect calm, must be very near madness. Yet what help but to tell the truth? Unless she feigned that Egremont's failure to come on Saturday was her fault, in the sense Thyrza believed, and then send for him, that this terrible mischief might be undone?

If only she could have time to reflect. Whatever she did now, in this agitation, she might bitterly repent. Only under stress of the direst necessity could she summon Egremont back; there was something repugnant to her instinct, something impossible, in the thought of undoing all she had done. Egremont's position would be ignoble. Impossible to retrace her steps!

'I have no wish to prevent you from seeing him, Thyrza,' she said, making her resolve even as she spoke. 'He is not in London now, but he will be back before long, I think.'

'Is he in England?'

'Yes; in the North. He has gone to see friends. You don't know that he has been in America during these two years?'

Something was gained if Thyrza could be brought to listen with interest to details.

'In America? But he came back at the time. How could you refuse to keep your promise? What did he say to you? How could he go away again and let you break your word to him in that way?'

Mrs. Ormonde said, as gently as she could:

'I didn't break my word, Thyrza. I gave him your address. He had it on Friday night.'

She, whose nature it was to trust implicitly, now dreaded a deceit in every word. She gazed at Mrs. Ormonde, without change of countenance.

'And,' she said, slowly, 'you persuaded him not to come.'

Mrs. Ormonde paused before replying.

'Thyrza, is all your faith in me at an end? Cannot I speak to you like I used to, and be sure that you trust my kindness to you, that you trust my love?'

'Your love?' Thyrza repeated, more coldly than she had spoken yet. 'And you persuaded him not to come to me.'

'It is true, I did.'

Mrs. Ormonde had never spoken to any one with a feeling of humiliation like this which made her bend her head. Thyrza still looked at her, but no longer with hostility. She gazed with wonder, with doubt.

'Why did you do that to me, Mrs. Ormonde?'

There was heart-breaking pathos in the simple words. Tears rushed to the listener's eyes.

'My child, if I had known the truth, I should have said not a word to prevent his going. I did not know that you still loved him, hard as it is for you to believe that. I was deceived by your face. I have watched you month after month, and, as I knew nothing of your reason for hope, I thought you had found comfort in other things. Cannot you believe me, Thyrza?'

'And you told him that?'