Satan was particularly fresh next morning when Tristram took him for a canter round the Park.  He was glad of it:  he required something to work off steam upon.  He was in a mood of restless excitement.  During the three weeks of Zara’s absence he had allowed himself to dream into a state of romantic love for her.  He had glossed over in his mind her distant coldness, her frigid adherence to the bare proposition, so that to return to that state of things had come to him as a shock.

But, this morning, he knew he was a fool to have expected anything else.  He was probably a great fool altogether, but he never changed his mind, and was prepared to pay the price of his folly.  After all, there would be plenty of time afterwards to melt her dislike, so he could afford to wait now.  He would not permit himself to suffer again as he had done last night.  Then he came in and had his bath, and made himself into a very perfect-looking lover, to present himself to his lady at about half-past twelve o’clock, to take her to his mother.

Zara was, if anything, whiter than usual when she came into the library where he was waiting for her alone.  The financier had gone to the City.  She had heavy, bluish shadows under her eyes, and he saw quite plainly that, the night before, she must have been weeping bitterly.

A great tenderness came over him.  What was this sorrow of hers?  Why might he not comfort her?  He put out both hands and then, as she remained stonily unresponsive, he dropped them, and only said quietly that he hoped she was well, and his motor was waiting outside, and that his mother, Lady Tancred, would be expecting them.

“I am ready,” said Zara.  And they went.

He told her as they flew along, that he had been riding in the Park that morning, and had looked up at the house and wondered which was her window; and then he asked her if she liked riding, and she said she had never tried for ten years ­the opportunity to ride had not been in her life ­but she used to like it when she was a child.

“I must get you a really well-mannered hack,” he said joyously.  Here was a subject she had not snubbed him over!  “And you will let me teach you again when we go down to Wrayth, won’t you?”

But before she could answer they had arrived at the house in Queen Street.

Michelham, with a subdued beam on his old face, stood inside the door with his footmen, and Tristram said gayly,

“Michelham, this is to be her new ladyship; Countess Shulski” ­and he turned to Zara.  “Michelham is a very old friend of mine, Zara.  We used to do a bit of poaching together, when I was a boy and came home from Eton.”

Michelham was only a servant and could not know of her degradation, so Zara allowed herself to smile and looked wonderfully lovely, as the old man said,

“I am sure I wish your ladyship every happiness, and his lordship, too; and, if I may say so, with such a gentleman your ladyship is sure to have it.”

And Tristram chaffed him, and they went upstairs.

Lady Tancred had rigidly refrained from questioning her daughters, on their return from the dinnerparty; she had not even seen them until the morning, and when they had both burst out with descriptions of their future sister-in-law’s beauty and strangeness their mother had stopped them.

“Do not tell me anything about her, dear children,” she had said.  “I wish to judge for myself without prejudice.”

But Lady Coltshurst could not be so easily repressed.  She had called early, on purpose to give her views, with the ostensible excuse of an inquiry about her sister-in-law’s health.

“I am afraid you will be rather unfavorably impressed with Tristram’s choice, when you have seen her, Jane,” she announced.  “I confess I was.  She treated us all as though she were conferring the honor, not receiving it, and she is by no means a type that promises domestic tranquillity for Tristram.”

“Really, Julia!” Lady Tancred protested.  “I must beg of you to say no more.  I have perfect confidence in my son, and wish to receive his future wife with every mark of affection.”

“Your efforts will be quite wasted, then, Jane,” her sister-in-law snapped.  “She is most forbidding, and never once unbent nor became genial, the whole evening.  And besides, for a lady, she is much too striking looking.”

“She cannot help being beautiful,” Lady Tancred said.  “I am sure I shall admire her very much, from what the girls tell me.  But we will not discuss her.  It was so kind of you to come, and my head is much better.”

“Then I will be off!” Lady Coltshurst sniffed in a slightly offended tone.  Really, relations were so tiresome!  They never would accept a word of advice or warning in the spirit it was given, and Jane in particular was unpleasantly difficult.

So she got into her electric brougham, and was rolled away, happily before Tristram and his lady appeared upon the scene; but the jar of her words still lingered with Lady Tancred, in spite of all her efforts to forget it.

Zara’s heart beat when they got to the door, and she felt extremely antagonistic.  Francis Markrute had left her in entire ignorance of the English customs, for a reason of his own.  He calculated if he informed her that on Tristram’s side it was purely a love match, she, with her strange temperament, and sense of honor, would never have accepted it.  He knew she would have turned upon him and said she could be no party to such a cheat.  He with his calm, calculating brain had weighed the pros and cons of the whole matter:  to get her to consent, for her brother’s sake in the beginning, under the impression that it was a dry business arrangement, equally distasteful personally to both parties ­to leave her with this impression and keep the pair as much as possible apart, until the actual wedding; and then to leave her awakening to Tristram ­was his plan.  A woman would be impossibly difficult to please, if, in the end, she failed to respond to such a lover as Tristram!  He counted upon what he had called her moral antennæ to make no mistakes.  It would not eventually prejudice matters if the family did find her a little stiff, as long as she did not actually show her contempt for their apparent willingness to support the bargain.  But her look of scorn, the night before, when he had shown some uneasiness on this score, had reassured him.  He would leave things alone and let her make her own discoveries.

So now she entered her future mother-in-law’s room, with a haughty mien and no friendly feelings in her heart.  She was well acquainted with the foreign examples of mother-in-law.  They interfered with everything and had their sons under their thumbs.  They seemed always mercenary, and were the chief agents in promoting a match, if it were for their own family’s advantage.  No doubt Uncle Francis had arranged the whole affair with this Lady Tancred in the first instance, and she, Zara, would not be required to keep up the comedy, as with the uncle and cousins.  She decided she would be quite frank with her if the occasion required, and if she should, by chance, make the same insinuation of the continuance of the Tancred race as Lady Ethelrida had innocently done, she would have plainly to say that was not in the transaction.  For her own ends she must be Lord Tancred’s wife and let her uncle have what glory he pleased from the position; if that were his reason, and as for Lord Trancred’s ends, he was to receive money.  That was all:  it was quite simple.

The two women were mutually surprised when they looked at one another.  Lady Tancred’s first impression was, “It is true she is a very disturbing type, but how well bred and how beautiful!” And Zara thought, “It is possible that, after all, I may be wrong.  She looks too proud to have stooped to plan this thing.  It may be only Lord Tancred’s doing ­men are more horrible than women.”

“This is Zara, Mother,” Tristram said.

And Lady Tancred held out her hands, and then drew her new daughter ­that was to be ­nearer and kissed her.

And over Zara there crept a thrill.  She saw that the elder lady was greatly moved, and no woman had kissed her since her mother’s death.  Why, if it were all a bargain, should she tenderly kiss her?

“I am so glad to welcome you, dear,” Lady Tancred said, determining to be very gracious.  “I am almost pleased not to have been able to go last night.  Now I can have you all to myself for this, our first little meeting.”

And they sat down on a sofa, and Zara asked about her head; and Lady Tancred told her the pain was almost gone, and this broke the ice and started a conversation.

“I want you to tell me of yourself,” Lady Tancred said.  “Do you think you will like this old England of ours, with its damp and its gloom in the autumn, and its beautiful fresh spring?  I want you to ­and to love your future home.”

“Everything is very strange to me, but I will try,” Zara answered.

“Tristram has been making great arrangements to please you at Wrayth,” Lady Tancred went on.  “But, of course, he has told you all about it.”

“I have had to be away all the time,” Zara felt she had better say ­and Tristram interrupted.

“They are all to be surprises, Mother; everything is to be new to Zara, from beginning to end.  You must not tell her anything of it.”

Then Lady Tancred spoke of gardens.  She hoped Zara liked gardens; she herself was a great gardener, and had taken much pride in her herbaceous borders and her roses at Wrayth.

And when they had got to this stage of the conversation Tristram felt he could safely leave them to one another, so, saying he wanted to talk to his sisters, he went out of the room.

“It will be such happiness to think of your living in the old home,” the proud lady said.  “It was a great grief to us all when we had to shut it up, two years ago; but you will, indeed, adorn it for its reopening.”

Zara did not know what to reply.  She vaguely understood that one might love a home, though she had never had one but the gloomy castle near Prague; and that made her sigh when she thought of it.

But a garden she knew she should love.  And Mirko was so fond of flowers.  Oh! if they would let her have a beautiful country home in peace, and Mirko to come sometimes, and play there, and chase butterflies, with his excited, poor little face, she would indeed be grateful to them.  Her thoughts went on in a dream of this, while Lady Tancred talked of many things, and she answered, “Yes,” and “No,” with gentle respect.  Her future mother-in-law’s great dignity pleased her sense of the fitness of things; she so disliked gush of any sort herself, and she felt now that she knew where she was and there need be no explanations.  The family, one and all, evidently intended to play the same part, and she would, too.  When the awakening came it would be between herself and Tristram.  Yes, she must think of him now as “Tristram!”

Her thoughts had wandered again when she heard Lady Tancred’s voice, saying,

“I wanted to give you this myself,” and she drew a small case from a table near and opened it, and there lay a very beautiful diamond ring.  “It is my own little personal present to you, my new, dear daughter.  Will you wear it sometimes, Zara, in remembrance of this day and in remembrance that I give into your hands the happiness of my son, who is dearer to me than any one on earth?”

And the two proud pairs of eyes met, and Zara could not answer, and there was a strange silence between them for a second.  And then Tristram came back into the room, which created a diversion, and she was enabled to say some ordinary conventional things about the beauty of the stones, and express her thanks for the gift.  Only, in her heart, she determined never to wear it.  It would burn her hand, she thought, and she could never be a hypocrite.

Luncheon was then announced, and they went into the dining-room.

Here she saw Tristram in a new light, with only “Young Billy” and Jimmy Danvers who had dropped in, and his mother and sisters.

He was gay as a schoolboy, telling Billy who had not spoken a word to Zara the night before that now he should sit beside her, and that he was at liberty to make love to his new cousin!  And Billy, aged nineteen ­a perfectly stolid and amiable youth ­proceeded to start a laborious conversation, while the rest of the table chaffed about things which were Greek to Zara, but she was grateful not to have to talk, and so passed off the difficulties of the situation.

And the moment the meal was over Tristram took her back to Park Lane.  He, too, was thankful the affair had been got through; he hardly spoke as they went along, and in silence followed her into the house and into the library, and there waited for her commands.

Whenever they were alone the disguises of the part fell from Zara, and she resumed the icy mien.

“Good-bye,” she said coldly.  “I am going into the country to-morrow for two or three days.  I shall not see you until Monday.  Have you anything more it is necessary to say?”

“You are going into the country!” Tristram exclaimed, aghast.  “But I will not ­” and then he paused, for her eyes had flashed ominously.  “I mean,” he went on, “must you go?  So soon before our wedding?”

She drew herself up and spoke in a scathing voice.

“Why must I repeat again what I said when you gave me your ring? ­I do not wish to see or speak with you.  You will have all you bargained for.  Can you not leave my company out of the question?”

The Tancred stern, obstinate spirit was thoroughly roused.  He walked up and down the room rapidly for a moment, fuming with hurt rage.  Then reason told him to wait.  He had no intention of breaking off the match now, no matter what she should do; and this was Thursday; there were only five more days to get through, and when once she should be his wife ­and then he looked at her, as she stood in her dark, perfect dress, with the great, sable wrap slipping from her shoulders and making a regal background, and her beauty fired his senses and made his eyes swim; and he bent forward and took her hand.

“Very well, you beautiful, unkind thing,” he said.  “But if you do not want to marry me you had better say so at once, and I will release you from your promise.  Because when the moment comes afterwards for our crossing of swords there will be no question as to who is to be master ­I tell you that now.”

And Zara dragged her hand from him, and, with the black panther’s glance in her eyes, she turned to the window and stood looking out.

Then after a second she said in a strangled voice,

“I wish that the marriage shall take place. ­And now, please go.”

And without further words he went.