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Captain Ingpen called next morning while she was at her letters after breakfast. She had felt sure that he would call early. He would miss his ring and he would hope that no one else would find it, and as she rose to meet him she wondered if yesterday’s episode could cover the pallor and fixity of her face; for her sleepless night had ravaged it. It had been with more than a hateful surmise that she had battled; there had been a hope as hateful. She had seen the vast form of a tidal wave rear itself on the horizon and had lain all night wondering whether its crash and engulfing was to sweep Hester out of their lives;—fearing, hoping, hating herself for the hope, yet not knowing whether to fear most or hope most that what seemed a wave was a mere cloud that a word with her friend would dissolve into thin air. If Hester was swept away, Godfrey Ingpen would be swept too; and Clive would be shattered. And as she saw Captain Ingpen and went forward in the bright morning light and smiled upon him, her integrity was restored to her; it was the cloud she hoped for; the cloud that he was to disperse. She waited for him to speak first.