"
Her father said nothing more, and Grace went away to the solitude
of her chamber.
Her heavy disquietude had many shapes; and for a time she put
aside the dominant fact to think of her too free conduct towards
Giles. His love-making had been brief as it was sweet; but would
he on reflection contemn her for forwardness? How could she have
been so simple as to suppose she was in a position to behave as
she had done! Thus she mentally blamed her ignorance; and yet in
the centre of her heart she blessed it a little for what it had
momentarily brought her.
CHAPTER XL.
Life among the people involved in these events seemed to be
suppressed and hide-bound for a while. Grace seldom showed
herself outside the house, never outside the garden; for she
feared she might encounter Giles Winterborne; and that she could
not bear.
This pensive intramural existence of the self-constituted nun
appeared likely to continue for an indefinite time. She had
learned that there was one possibility in which her formerly
imagined position might become real, and only one; that her
husband's absence should continue long enough to amount to
positive desertion.
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