Out of her sphere - University Library

BEATEY LA YTON'S PROMISE. 167
ance he had heard even up in London, but
it had not seemed to him at all to be mar-
velled at, that she should have left her
home and her husband, simply because she
v^as thoroughly weary of both. He had
not himself connected Audley Dale with
her flight, but it would not have surprised
him if other people had done so ; but to lay
her murder at his door—his ;
and he one of
the kindest, if one of the weakest of men»
—
was an absurdity so great, that if it had not
been for its attendant horrors, and the
fact that, one way or another, it seemed
dear Henrietta Thornton had come foully
to her end, he must have laughed at it.
As it was, laughing was out of the ques-
tion ; so also was love-making for the pre-
sent, although he had come down with the
full intention of proceeding in his suit.
They were near Beechside before Beatey
had finished her narrative. " I must go
in,^' she said, as soon as she had concluded,