Down at Tilgate, meanwhile, Elma Clifford had met more than once with Cyril Waring at friends’ houses around, for ever since the accident, Society had made up its mind that Elma ought to marry her companion in the tunnel; and, when Society once makes up its mind on a question of this sort, why, it does its level best in the long run to insure the fulfilment of its own prediction.

Wherever Elma had met her painter, however, during those few short weeks, she had seen him only before the quizzing eyes of all the world; and though she admitted to herself that she liked him very much, she was nevertheless so thoroughly frightened by her own performance after the Holkers’ party that she almost avoided him, in spite of officious friends—partly, it is true, from a pure feeling of maidenly shame, but partly also from a deeper-seated and profoundly moral belief that with this fierce mad taint upon her as she naturally thought, it would be nothing short of wrong in her even to marry. She couldn’t meet Cyril now without thinking at once of that irresistible impulse which had seized her by the throat, as it were, and bent her to its wild will in her own room after their interview at the Holkers’; and the thought did far more than bring a deep blush into her rich brown cheek—it made her feel most acutely she must never dream of burdening him with that terrible uncertainty and all it might enclose in it of sinister import.

For Elma felt sure she was mad that night. And, if so, oh, how could she poison Cyril Waring’s life with so unspeakable an inheritance for himself and his children?

She didn’t know, what any psychologist might at once have told her, that no one with the fatal taint of madness in her blood could ever even have thought of that righteous self-denial. Such scruples have no place in the selfish insane temperament; they belong only to the highest and purest types of moral nature.

One morning, however, a few weeks later, Elma had strolled off by herself into Chetwood Forest, without any intention of going anywhere in particular, save for a solitary walk, when suddenly, a turn round the corner of a devious path brought her face to face all at once with a piece of white canvas, stretched opposite her on an easel; at the other side of which, to her profound dismay, an artist in a grey tweed suit was busily working.

The artist, as it happened, didn’t see her at once, for the canvas stretched between them, shutting her out from his eyes, and Elma’s light footstep on the mossy ground hadn’t aroused his attention. So the girl’s first impulse was to retrace her way unobtrusively without exchanging a word, and retire round the corner again, before Cyril could recognise her. But somehow, when she came to try, she couldn’t. Her feet refused point blank to obey her will. And this time, in her own heart, she knew very well why. For there in the background, coiled up against the dense wall of rock and fern, Sardanapalus lay knotted in sleepy folds, with his great ringed back shining blue in the sunlight that struggled in round patches through the shimmering foliage. More consciously now than even in the train, the beautiful deadly creature seemed to fascinate Elma and bind her to the spot. For a moment she hesitated, unable to resist the strange, inexplicable attraction that ran in her blood. That brief interval settled it. Even as she paused, Cyril glanced round at the snake to note the passing effect of a gleam of light that fell slantwise through the leaves to dapple his spotty back—and caught sight of Elma. The poor girl gave a start. It was too late now to retreat. She stood there rooted.

Cyril moved forward to meet her with a frankly outstretched hand. “Good morning, Miss Clifford,” he said, in his cheery manly voice. “So you’ve dropped down by accident upon my lair here, have you? Well, I’m glad you’ve happened to pass by to-day, for this, do you know, is my very last morning. I’m putting the finishing touches upon my picture now before I take it back to town. I go away to-morrow, perhaps to North Wales, perhaps to Scotland.”

Elma trembled a little at those words, in spite of resolution; for though she could never, never, never marry him, it was nice, of course, to feel he was near at hand, and to have the chance of seeing him, and avoiding him as far as possible, on other people’s lawns at garden parties. She trembled and turned pale. She could never MARRY him, to be sure; but then she could never marry any one else either; and that being so, she liked to SEE him now and again, on neutral ground, as it were, and to know he was somewhere that she could meet him occasionally. Wales and Scotland are so distant from Surrey. Elma showed in her face at once that she thought them both unpleasantly remote from Craighton, Tilgate.

With timid and shrinking steps, she came in front of the picture, and gazed at it in detail long and attentively. Never before did she know how fond she was of art.

“It’s beautiful,” she said, after a pause; “I like it immensely. That moss is so soft, and the ferns are so delicate. And how lovely that patch of rich golden light is on Sardanapalus’s shoulder.”

The painter stepped back a pace or two and examined his own handicraft, with his head on one side, in a very critical attitude. “I don’t know that I’m quite satisfied after all with the colour-scheme,” he said, glancing askance at Elma. “I fancy it’s, perhaps, just a trifle too green. It looks all right, of course, out here in the open; but the question is, when it’s hung in the Academy, surrounded by warm reds, and purples, and blues, won’t it look by comparison much too cabbagey and too grassy?”

Elma drew a deep breath.

“Oh, Mr. Waring,” she cried, in a deprecating tone, holding her breath for awe.

It pained her that anybody—even Cyril himself—should speak so lightly about so beautiful a picture.

“Then you like it?” Cyril asked, turning round to her full face and fronting her as she stood there, all beautiful blushes through her creamy white skin.