She delighted in playing the mother to him.  “Now you must go back to your desk,” she would say masterfully.  “You have three hours’ work to do to-night yet.”

“It can wait.  Let me stay a little longer with you, Grizel,” he answered humbly.  Ha! it was Tommy who was humble now.  Not so long ago he would not have allowed his work to wait for anyone, and Grizel knew it, and exulted.

“To work, sir,” she ordered.  “And you must put on your old coat before you sit down to write, and pull up your cuffs so that they don’t scrape on the desk.  Also, you must not think too much about me.”

She tried to look businesslike, but she could scarce resist rocking her arms with delight when she heard herself saying such things to him.  It was as if she had the old doctor once more in her hands.

“What more, Grizel?  I like you to order me about.”

“Only this.  Good afternoon.”

“But I am to walk home with you,” he entreated.

“No,” she said decisively; but she smiled:  once upon a time it had been she who asked for this.

“If you are good,” she said, “you shall perhaps see me to-morrow.”

“Perhaps only?” He was scared; but she smiled happily again:  it had once been she who had to beg that there should be no perhaps.

“If you are good,” she replied,—­“and you are not good when you have such a long face.  Smile, you silly boy; smile when I order you.  If you don’t I shall not so much as look out at my window to-morrow.”

He was the man who had caused her so much agony, and she was looking at him with the eternally forgiving smile of the mother.  “Ah, Grizel,” Tommy cried passionately, “how brave and unselfish and noble you are, and what a glorious wife God intended you to be!”

She broke from him with a little cry, but when she turned round again it was to nod and smile to him.

CHAPTER XX

A LOVE-LETTER

Some beautiful days followed, so beautiful to Grizel that as they passed away she kissed her hand to them.  Do you see her standing on tiptoe to see the last of them?  They lit a fire in the chamber of her soul which is the home of all pure maids, and the fagots that warmed Grizel were every fond look that had been on her lover’s face and every sweet word he had let fall.  She counted and fondled them, and pretended that one was lost that she might hug it more than all the others when it was found.  To sit by that fire was almost better than having the days that lit it; sometimes she could scarcely wait for the day to go.

Tommy’s fond looks and sweet words!  There was also a letter in those days, and, now that I remember, a little garnet ring; and there were a few other fagots, but all so trifling it must seem incredible to you that they could have made so great a blaze—­nothing else in it, on my honour, except a girl’s heart added by herself that the fire might burn a moment longer.