What would his life be without remembrance of Evelyn?  He had come home believing himself reconciled to the loss of Evelyn, and willing to live in memories of her—­the management of his estate a sufficient interest for his life, and his thoughts were already engaged in the building of a new gatehouse; after all, Riversdale was his business, and he had come home to work for his successor while cherishing a dream—­ wasn’t it strange?  But this letter had torn down his dream and his life was again in pieces.  Would he ever be at rest while she was abroad?  Would it not have been better for them both if she had remained in her convent?  The thought seemed odiously selfish.  If she were to read his disappointment on hearing that she was no longer in the convent? ...  Telepathy!  There were instances!  And his thoughts drifted away, and he seemed to lose consciousness of everything, until he was awakened by the butler bringing back her reply.

Now he would see her in twenty-four hours, and hear from her lips a story of adventure, for it is an adventure to renounce the world, the greatest, unless a return to the world be a greater.  She had known both; and it would be interesting to hear her tell both stories—­if she could tell her stories; she might only be half aware of their interest and importance.

“God only knows what she is like now!  A wreck, a poor derelict woman, with no life to call her own.  The life of an actress which I gave her, and which was so beautiful, wrecked; and the life of a nun, which she insisted on striving after, wrecked.”  A cold, blighting sorrow like a mist came up, it seemed to penetrate to his very bones, and he asked why she had left the convent—­of what use could she be out of it?... only to torment him again.  Twenty times during the course of the evening and the next morning he resolved not to go to see her, and as many times a sudden desire to see her ripped up his resolution; and he ordered the brougham.  “Five years’ indulgence in vigils and abstinences, superstitions must have made a great change in her; utterly unlike the Evelyn Innes whom I discovered years ago in Dulwich, the beautiful pagan girl whom I took away to Paris.”  He was convinced.  But anxious to impugn his conviction, he took her letter from his pocket, and in it discovered traces, which cheered him, of the old Evelyn.

“She must have suffered terribly on finding herself obliged after five years to retreat, and something of the original spirit was required for her to fight her way out, for, of course, she was opposed at every moment.”

The little stations went by one by one:  the train stopped nine or ten times before it reached the penultimate.

“In the next few minutes I shall see her.  She is sure to come to the station to meet me.  If she doesn’t I’ll go back—­what an end that would be!  A strange neighbourhood to choose.  Why did she come here?  With whom is she living?  In a few minutes I shall know.”