But he was quite unable to fix his mind upon the words before him.

He had spoken to his wife on that morning in the strongest language he could use as to the unseemliness of her intimacy with Colonel Osborne; and then, the first thing she had done when his back was turned was to write to this very Colonel Osborne, and tell him, no doubt, what had occurred between her and her husband.

He sat thinking of it all for many minutes.

He would probably have declared himself that he had thought of it for an hour as he sat there.

Then he got up, went up-stairs and walked slowly into the drawing-room.