“I see!  A tragedy—­and a common one!  Well, in half an hour I shall be ready for his lordship.  Will you arrange it?  I must write a letter first.”

Miss Field nodded and departed.  Meadows honestly meant to follow her into the house and write some pressing business letters.  But the sunshine was so delightful, the sight of the empty bench and the abandoned novel on the other side of the lawn so beguiling, that after all he turned his lazy steps thither-ward, half ashamed, half amused to think how well Lady Dunstable had read his character.

The guests had all disappeared.  Meadows had the garden to himself, and all its summer prospect of moor and stream.  It was close on noon—­a hot and heavenly day!  And again he thought of Doris cooped up in London.  Perhaps, after all, he would get out of that cruise!

Ah! there was the morning train—­the midnight express from King’s Cross just arriving in the busy little town lying in the valley at his feet.  He watched it gliding along the valley, and heard the noise of the brakes.  Were any new guests expected by it? he wondered.  Hardly!  The Lodge seemed quite full.

* * * * *

Twenty minutes later he threw away the novel impatiently.  Midway, the story had gone to pieces.  He rose from his feet, intending this time to tackle his neglected duties in earnest.  As he did so, he heard a motor climbing the steep drive, and in front of it a lady, walking.

He stood arrested—­in a stupor of astonishment.

Doris!—­by all the gods!—­Doris!

It was indeed Doris.  She came wearily, looking from side to side, like one uncertain of her way.  Then she too perceived Meadows, and stopped.

Meadows was conscious of two mixed feelings—­first, a very lively pleasure at the sight of her, and then annoyance.  What on earth had she come for?  To recover him?—­to protest against his not writing?—­to make a scene, in short?  His guilty imagination in a flash showed her to him throwing herself into his arms—­weeping—­on this wide lawn—­for all the world to see.

But she did nothing of the kind.  She directed the motor, which was really a taxi from the station, to stop without approaching the front door, and then she herself walked quickly towards her husband.

“Arthur!—­you got my letter?  I could only write yesterday.”

She had reached him, and they had joined hands mechanically.

“Letter?—­I got no letter!  If you posted one, it has probably arrived by your train.  What on earth, Doris, is the meaning of this?  Is there anything wrong?”

His expression was half angry, half concerned, for he saw plainly that she was tired and jaded.  Of course!  Long journeys always knocked her up.  She meanwhile stood looking at him as though trying to read the impression produced on him by her escapade.  Something evidently in his manner hurt her, for she withdrew her hand, and her face stiffened.