that nothing could be done without your advice and help--and yet, now you
have come, it seems that there is nothing left for you to say or do." She
paused for a moment, then added: "You know we are going back to
Cairncross."

I stared at her, aghast. The best thing I could say was, "Nonsense!"

She smiled wearily. "So I might have known you would say. But it is the
truth, none the less."

"You must be crazy!"

"No, Douw, only very, very wretched!"

The poor girl's voice faltered as she spoke, and I thought I saw the
glisten of tears in her eyes. She had borne so brave and calm a front
through all her trouble, that this suggestion of a sob wrung my heart with
the cruelty of a novel sorrow. I drew my chair nearer to her.

"Tell me about it all, Daisy--if you can."

Her answer was to impulsively take a letter from her pocket and hand it to
me. She would have recalled it an instant later.

"No--give it me back," she cried. "I forgot! There are things in it you
should not see."

But even as I held it out to her, she changed her mind once again.

"No--read it," she said, sinking back in her chair; "it can make no