To which she answered with a catch in her breath, “The greatest comfort.”

They reached the great grey house and entered.  A letter lay on the table by the door.  Avery took it up with a sharp shiver.

“Prom Piers?” asked Tudor abruptly.

She bent her head.  “He writes—­every week.”

“When is he coming home?” He uttered the question with a directness that sounded almost brutal, but Avery caught the note of anxiety behind it and understood.

She opened the letter in silence, and read it by the waning light of the open door.  The crackling of the fire behind her was the only sound within.  Without, the wind moaned desolately through the bare trees.  It was going to rain.

Slowly Avery raised her head at last and gazed out into the gathering dark.

“Come inside!” said Tudor peremptorily.

His hand closed upon her arm, he almost compelled her.  “How painfully thin you are!” he said, as she yielded.  “Are you starving yourself of food as well as rest?”

Again she did not answer him.  Her eyes were fixed, unseeing.  They focused their gaze upon the fire as he led her to it.  She sat down in the chair he placed for her and then very suddenly she began to shiver as if with an ague.

“Don’t!” said Tudor sharply.

He bent over her, his hands upon her shoulders, holding her.

She controlled herself, and leaned back.  “Do sit down, doctor!  I’m afraid I’m very rude—­very forgetful.  Will you ring for tea?  Piers is in town.  He writes very kindly, very—­very considerately.  He is only just back from Egypt—­he and Mr. Crowther.  The last letter was from Cairo.  Would you—­do you care to see what he says?”

She offered him the letter with the words, and after the faintest hesitation Tudor took it.

“I have come back to be near you.”  So without preliminary the letter ran.  “You will not want me, I know, but still—­I am here.  For Heaven’s sake, take care of yourself, and have anything under the sun that you need.  Your husband, Piers.”

It only covered the first page.  Tudor turned the sheet frowningly and replaced it in its envelope.

“He always writes like that,” said Avery.  “Every week—­all through the winter—­just a sentence or two.  I haven’t written at all to him though I’ve tried—­till I couldn’t try any more.”

She spoke with a weariness so utter that it seemed to swamp all feeling.  Tudor turned his frowning regard upon her.  His eyes behind their glasses intently searched her face.

“How does he get news of you?” he asked abruptly.

“Through Mrs. Lorimer.  She writes to him regularly, I believe,—­either she or Jeanie.  I suppose—­presently—­”

Avery stopped, her eyes upon the fire, her hands tightly clasped before her.

“Presently?” said Tudor.

She turned her head slightly, without moving her eyes.  “Presently there will have to be some—­mutual arrangement made.  But I can’t see my way yet.  I can’t consider the future at all.  I feel as if night were falling.  Perhaps—­for me—­there is no future.”