Cecil felt as if the screw she had been long working had come off in her hands.  She frowned, she gazed, collecting her senses, while Raymond added, “It is to my intense grief and mortification, but I suppose you are gratified.”

“Uh, it would never do!” she exclaimed, to his surprise and pleasure.

“Quite right,” he returned.  “Just what I felt.  Nothing can make me so glad as to see that you think the idea as socking as I do.”

“Our going to Swanslea would be much better—­far more natural, and no one could object.  We could refurnish, and make it perfect; whereas nothing can be done to this place, so inconveniently built and buried in trees.  I should feel much freer in a place of my own.”

“So that is what you meant when I thought you were thinking of my mother?”

“I am obliged to take thought for myself when you take heed to no one but her,” said Cecil; and as the carriage was at that moment announced, she left him.  Which was the most sick at heart it would be hard to say, the wife with the sense that she was postponed in everything to the mother, the husband at the alienation that had never before been so fully expressed.  Cecil’s errand was a council about the bazaar; and driving round by Sirenwood, Lady Tyrrell became her companion in the carriage.  The quick eyes soon perceived that something had taken place, and confidence was soon drawn forth.

“The ice is broken; and by whom do you think?”

“By la belle mere?  Skilful strategy to know when the position is not tenable.”

“She wants to retreat to Church-house.”

“Don’t consent to that.”

“I said I should prefer Swanslea for ourselves.”

“Hold to that, whatever you do.  If she moves to the village you will have all the odium and none of the advantages.  There will be the same daily haunt; and as to your freedom of action, there are no spies like the abdicated and their dependents.  A very clever plan, but don’t be led away by it.”

“No,” said Cecil, resolutely; but after a moment:  “It would be inconvenient to Raymond to live so far away from the property.”

“Swanslea will be property too, and a ride over on business is not like strolling in constantly.”

“I know I shall never feel like my own mistress in a house of hers.”

“Still less with her close by, with the Rectory family running in and out to exchange remarks.  No, no, hold fast to insisting that she must not leave the ancestral halls.  That you can do dutifully and gracefully.”

Cecil knew she had been betrayed into the contrary; but they were by this time in the High Street, bowing to others of the committee on their way to the town-hall, a structure of parti-coloured brick in harlequin patterns, with a peaked roof, all over little sham domes, which went far to justify its title of the Rat-house, since nothing larger could well use them.  The facade was thus somewhat imposing; of the rear the less said the better; and as to the interior, it was at present one expanse of dust, impeded by scaffold-poles, and all the windows had large blotches of paint upon them.