“For his own good, Fenella!”
“It is best for a child to be with his mother.”
He looked at her fixedly, but very sadly and seriously.
“Do you think so,” he asked slowly—“in this case?”
Then she understood. Understood, that because of the brand of Cain upon her brow, the world would not think it good for her boy to be brought up by his own mother!
Her cup of woe was indeed full. She bowed her head—the bright brown head that he would have died to serve—upon her hands, and wept aloud.
“Don’t,” he said, a little unsteadily; “don’t give way; be brave, as you always have been, my dear. Live down this story—this stain upon your life; go to other countries, where no one will know you; make new friends, who will have heard nothing. The world is before you; leave England, and do not come back to your boy till time has covered up with its kindly mantle this wretched episode of your life. Ronny shall be well cared for. I will look after him, and write to you constantly about him. Only—for his own sake—separate yourself entirely from him, until he is old enough to know and to choose.”
He waited for a moment, looking at her yearningly and anxiously, but the bowed head never stirred. Then, in the silence and gloom of the bare and half-lit room, he turned, and left her alone in her sorrow and her desolation.
Thirty-six hours later Fenella stood by herself upon the deck of a Channel steamer, watching the white cliffs of England as they receded further and further into the distance. She was quite alone in the world—she had not even taken a maid with her. She had made up her mind that she would break every connection of her former life, and start entirely anew. There should not be even a servant about her to remind her of her past. It was for this reason that she had decided to go to the Channel Islands—for a time at least, until she could settle her further plans. Guernsey was a quiet and comparatively secluded place, and she was not likely to meet any of her former friends and acquaintances there, and it would be easy to go on to France from there, should she feel inclined to do so.
Jacynth entirely approved of her idea, and went down himself with her to Weymouth to see her off. To be with her in so close a friendship, and yet to be unable even to take her hand as a friend should do, was inexpressibly painful to him, yet he did not shrink from sacrificing his own feelings in order to serve her, whom, in spite of everything, he still loved and admired more than any woman on earth.