But once she had left the hall, going to the back of the house she began to be busy as a bird is busy with its nest. Already in one of the rooms each piece of furniture was in its place, the windows were curtained, and even some rugs had been unrolled upon the bare floor. Now Joanna fetched fuel from the kitchen, for the evening was cool, almost frosty, and when the fire had burned up she drew the curtains and began to unpack by candlelight.

For the last forty-eight hours she had been planning for this. Every least thing had been thought of beforehand. She was of those who ever desire material fitness and she had discovered the same desire in Louis also. It was one of the many bonds between their natures. In a suit-case she had put together the few family possessions which had seemed to her worthy of her lover’s eye, and it did not take her long to dispose these. The result was far enough from the perfect beauty she longed for, but as she looked round upon her work she had a strong feeling of pleasure. In the flickering light of fire and candles it was a room prepared for the beloved and therefore lovely. For the first time Joanna was alive to the clear sincerity of design in the high silver candlesticks which had been a presentation to Horatio Bannerman from the St. Jude’s congregation on the twenty-fifth anniversary of his ministry – and the foreign shawl, spread as a coverlet upon the wide mahogany couch gave a glamour.

Then putting on her hat, and fingering the latch-key in her pocket to be quite sure she had it safe, she went out to the shops.

More than once during her errands there she asked herself what she was doing. She had no remembrance of having planned this. It was as though she were blindly carrying out the orders of another. But in one place there was a clock which pointed to half-past seven, and straight on that panic seized her. Louis, if he got no further message, was to be with her soon after eight, to sup with her. This sudden knowledge, as it seemed, sent her hastening toward home again. The parcels she had bought kept slipping precariously through her trembling fingers.

“I can still change my mind,” she told herself as she plodded back in an agony to the house, – “or something may have prevented him so that he won’t come – in any case I have only to tell him to go,” and a wild aloof amusement shot through her at the thought that she might simply not open the door if he came.

But on her return to the Quadrant where the house was the last in a short, blind row, she saw that some one stood there. Her heart thudded sickly. In spite of the uncertain light, she recognized the figure of Mrs. Boyd, Mrs. Boyd!