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Lady Jeffreys met her husband in the square oak-panelled hall, which gave directly on every portion of the old house. She was coming out of the little parlour on the left, having duly finished tea.

“Ah, Sir Baldwin,” she said in that affected, mincing way which had grown on her in the past two years, “your groom has just been round from the stables! He wanted to know at what hour you wish to start, since you must return to Ashford to-night.”

In a moment all Sir Baldwin’s good humour had vanished. He frowned, and his handsome face wore an air of deep wrath and also of gloom, and anyone could see that to speak politely and quietly now cost him no little effort. It required no great power of observation to see that a matrimonial storm was effectually brewing — nay, it even seemed as if the storm had already broken out previously, and that the halt at Old Manor Farm had been but a momentary lull between two vigorous claps of thunder.

Olive stood in the hall, looking remarkably pert and pretty. She was beautifully dressed in a gown of emerald-green silk, with trimmings of black braid and quaint buttons. She had a very slim waist, and the elongated shape of her bodice and full gathers in the skirt set off her trim figure to great advantage.

She had taken off her bonnet, and her fair hair now showed all round her head in a maze of innumerable curls and puffs, which were richly set off by a high comb of pierced tortoiseshell. No doubt she was excessively pretty, and so dainty, too, from the tip of her dainty leather shoe and her fine white silk stockings to the cluster of curls that fell each side of her small oval face from the temple to the cheek, and anyone who was not observant would naturally marvel how any husband could scowl on such a picture.

She looked very provocative just now, with her head cocked on one side like a pert robin, one hand on her hip, and the other swinging an embroidered reticule by its long delicate chain.

Sir Baldwin looked on her, and the scowl darkened yet more deeply on his face. But he made no comment in reply to what she had said, until Aunt Caroline’s entrance into the hall recalled him to himself; then he asked calmly:

“And what answer did your ladyship give to my groom?”

“That you would start within half an hour,” she replied flippantly.

“Nay, Olive,” said Aunt Caroline from under the lintel of the museum door; “perhaps Sir Baldwin may be persuaded to tarry with us until to-morrow at the least.”

“That were presumptuous on my part, Madam,” said Sir Baldwin, “since my wife seems so mightily eager to rid herself of me.”

Olive laughed lightly, but I must say that her laughter sounded a little forced and devoid of true mirth.

“Faith!” she said, “with your temper at boiling point, you have not been an agreeable companion.”

“I intruded as little as I could on your ladyship’s privacy,” he retorted.

“I could have come down here alone,” she said. “The coachman surely knows the way between Ashford and Birchington. I had a postilion — your presence was unnecessary, and ’twas you forced your escort on me, remember!”

“My dear Olive!” exclaimed Aunt Caroline, who was genuinely shocked.

Sir Baldwin’s face had become very pale, but evidently he was too polite to allow his temper to get the better of him in the presence of his hostess. But this was not to say that he would permit his wife to aim her unpleasant shafts at him without meting her some measure of punishment.

“As your conduct with a young jackanapes has lately made your ladyship the talk of the town,” he said coldly, “I preferred that you should not travel alone.”

“Lest my departure be construed into an elopement,” she retorted, with a show of spite, “perhaps with Lieutenant Carrington on board the Dolphin — or is it someone else just now? Faith, your insane jealousy makes you the talk of the town!”

“Olive, I pray you,” interposed Aunt Caroline, who was becoming alarmed both at Olive’s spiteful vehemence and Sir Baldwin’s unnatural calm, “remember he is your husband!”

“Great Heavens, Aunt,” cried Olive at the top of her high-pitched voice, “would that I could forget it sometimes!”

“It would be an evil day for your ladyship if you were to do so!” said Sir Baldwin, who at Olive’s last words had flushed to the roots of his hair, and now had much ado to keep his rage under control.

He looked so wrathful just then, and his eyes shot so much anger upon his wife, that instinctively the flippancy of her manner died down. Her oval cheeks became quite white, and, though she strove to laugh again, it was obvious that she stood somewhat in awe of her husband’s present mood. But, like all women who find pleasure in worrying and teasing a man, she would not let him see for a moment that she was frightened. Therefore she laughed and pouted and shrugged her dainty round shoulders — did many things, in fact, to hide the quivering of her lips and the trembling of her hands.

“Oh, ho, ho, ho!” she exclaimed a little shrilly. “Faith, but this is interesting! And you, Sir Baldwin, grow more and more charming, every day! Violence and abuse have I suffered in plenty. It is threats this time, eh?”

“I never threaten,” said Sir Baldwin quietly, “as your ladyship is well aware — save when I am prepared to act—”

“The part of a coward?” she interposed quickly. Aunt Caroline threw up her hands in horror. Never in all her life had she heard a wife thus addressing her husband. She herself had oft cause to be firm with Jasper, but never — oh, never! — would she dream of being anything but polite to him.

“No,” Sir Baldwin said quietly; “rather the part of a judge, and if necessary that of an—”

“Sir Baldwin!” shrieked Aunt Caroline, terrified.

Olive, too, was very frightened now. No doubt she knew her husband well, and knew how much determination and vindictiveness lay behind his calm and gentleman-like manner. She had teased him often enough before — teased him until he lost all control over himself, and had perforce to fly out of her room lest his temper should induce him to do her some injury. But to-day she had evidently provoked him further than a mere outburst of rage, and the fact that he did keep his rage so completely under control proved to her that deeper determination lay in him now than had ever been there before.

But, womanlike, she would not even now let him see that she was afraid of him: what she did not mind his seeing was that she hated him, and this she tried to convey to him by a look. She drew up her graceful figure and tossed her head defiantly, and you should have seen her eyes then — narrowed until they were mere slits, whilst a row of tiny white teeth buried themselves in her lower lip.

“I hate you!”

She did not say it, but she looked it. Every line in her face spoke of it and every movement of her body proclaimed the fact, and Sir Baldwin Jeffreys, being no fool, could read those lines plainly enough even as she sailed past him straight up the stairs on her way to her room.

Sir Baldwin as soon as she was out of sight seemed to recover his normal balance. The scowl was still there on his face, and dark thoughts must indeed have been chasing one another behind that frowning brow of his. But good breeding prevented his showing more of his feelings now, and, moreover, he really was very fond of his wife, and put all her coquetries down to youth and inexperience. As a rule, when she provoked him beyond endurance he found that an hour or two away from her presence restored his equanimity and reinflamed his ardour and admiration for her beauty.

And she really could be very engaging when she chose. Sir Baldwin still cherished in his heart many happy recollections of her affection for him, and of her pretty show of gratitude, whenever — after a matrimonial tiff — he strove to console her by the present of a handsome ring or some other article of jewellery which she had previously coveted. Until recently she had shown him quite a good deal of deference, never flouting him in public, as many fashionable women were wont to do to their husbands; and he firmly believed that all her flirtations — and these were many — had been absolutely innocent, and merely the result of childlike belief in her own charms.

But Sir Baldwin was a very proud man, and fully conscious of his five-and-forty years and of the ridicule which is wont to assail a middle-aged husband when the wife happens to be young and pretty. During the last London season gossip had been over-busy with Lady Jeffreys, and this he did not like. In his own estimation, the wife of Sir Baldwin Jeffreys should be beyond suspicion, and for the past few months now he had oft heard veiled insinuating talk; aimed against his wife.

The name of a certain Lieutenant Carrington, of H. M. S. Dolphin, had been coupled with that of Lady Jeffreys. The young man was well-looking and of approved family connections. He had greatly distinguished himself recently in the China seas, and on his return home had been much fêted, in London society. Sir Baldwin knew him to be an upright and honourable fellow incapable of vulgar intrigue, but Lady Jeffreys had smiled on Lieutenant Carrington in a manner calculated to turn the head of any unsophisticated young man fresh from the China seas. Whereupon heads began to nod and tongues to wag.

Sir Baldwin was very angry, and all through the early part of the London season there were many hot and bitter quarrels between himself and his lady. Now the season was still at its height, and Lady Jeffreys’s reputation had become a rag in the hands of her friends. Sir Baldwin was very wrathful, and suddenly took it upon himself to announce to his wife that she must forthwith prepare to quit London, for he had decided that she should spend the rest of the summer at their country house near Ashford.

He had expected protestations, tears, even angry refusal, at this preposterous notion of quitting London the second week in June, when the season was at its height and the invitations for Lady Sydney’s ball and the Duchess of Kent’s reception were just out. To his astonishment, Lady Jeffreys received the dictum in perfect meekness, with downcast eyes and lips slightly twitching, but otherwise in absolute submission to her husband’s will. All she stipulated as a reward for passive obedience — and this, too, came as a humble request — was that she should spend the beautiful month of June in her old home in Thanet. It would ease the sadness of her heart, she said, and raised a lace pocket handkerchief to her eyes.

Sir Baldwin Jeffreys promptly chided himself for being a brute and a bully, and — given the slightest encouragement — he would then and there have made amends for his harshness by changing his intentions and allowing his pretty, submissive wife to remain in London for as long as she pleased. But, strangely enough, Lady Jeffreys discouraged all attempts at reconciliation, and, with what seemed to him wilful obstinacy, persisted now in her desire to spend a few weeks with her uncle and aunt at Old Manor Farm.

Whilst Sir Baldwin completed his arrangements with regard to the care of his London house whilst her ladyship would be away, Olive remained perfectly charming, even-tempered and gentle. During three days Sir Baldwin Jeffreys felt himself once more a happy man. Every cloud on the horizon of his matrimonial heaven seemed to have been dissipated as if by magic, and he realised that in this simple-hearted country girl he had absolutely found an ideal mate, and that it was his harshness and jealous temper alone that had warped her exquisite disposition.

On the fourth day, when every preparation was complete and the caretaker and his family were duly installed in the house in St. James’s street, Lady Jeffreys suddenly changed her tune. Meekness, submission, and gentleness seemed to have vanished with her boxes, which had been sent on by the luggage chaise. Once more she became the capricious, exacting woman who in the past three years had well-nigh broken Sir Baldwin Jeffreys’s heart and certainly soured his disposition. She told him very plainly what her feelings were towards him, and these certainly were anything but kindly; she derided him for his jealousy, upbraided him for his harshness, scorned him for his approaching middle age, and finally called him a fool for having been so easily gulled into the belief that she would ever become the submissive slave of an abominable tyrant.

She posed as a martyr to his brutality, and finally entered her coach with wrath expressed in every line of her figure and triumph blazing — unseen by him — in her eyes.

Thus they travelled to Ashford — she alone in the coach, he riding silently by its side. Thus they spent one night in their beautiful country house without exchanging one single word of friendship. She closed her door on him and refused to respond to every overture of peace, until his remorse changed once more to wrath, and he brought her silently to Old Manor Farm, nursing his wrongs and vaguely thinking of revenge.