"Then you care for some one else? That is what it is."
"I suppose it is," said Janetta.
And then a very different kind of blush began—a blush of shame, which dyed her forehead and ears and neck with so vivid a crimson hue that Sir Philip averted his eyes in honest sympathy.
"I'm afraid, then," he said, ruefully, but kindly, "that there's nothing more to be said."
"Nothing," said Janetta, wishing her cheeks would cool.
Sir Philip rose from his chair, and stood for a moment as if not knowing whether to go or stay. Janetta rose too.
"If you were to change your mind——" he said.
"This is a thing about which I could not possibly change my mind, Sir Philip."
"I am sorry for it." And then he took his leave, and Janetta went to her room to bathe her hot face and to wonder at the way in which the whirligig of Time brings its revenges.
"Who would have thought it?" she said to herself, half diverted and half annoyed. "When Miss Polehampton used to lecture me on the difference of Margaret's position and mine, and when Lady Caroline patronized me, I certainly never thought that I should be asked to become Lady Ashley. To take Margaret's place! I have a feeling—and I always had—that he is the proper husband for her, and that everything will yet come right between them. If I had said 'yes'—if I only could have said 'yes,' for the children's sake—I should never have got over the impression that Margaret was secretly reproaching me! And as it is, she may reproach me yet. For Wyvis will not make her happy if he marries her: and she will not make Wyvis happy. And as for me, although he is, I suppose, legally divorced from his wife, I do not think that I could bear to marry him under such circumstances. But Margaret is different, perhaps, from me."