“You are as steady-going as a professional,” he told her once.

To which she answered with her sad smile, “I served my probation in the school of sorrow last year.  I am only able to help her because I know what it is to sit in ashes.”

He patted her shoulder and called her a good girl.  He was growing very fond of her, and in his blunt, unflattering way he let her know it.

Certain it was that in those terrible days following her bereavement, Daisy clung to her as she had never before clung to any one, scarcely speaking to her, but mutely leaning upon her steadfast strength.

Muriel saw but little of Blake though he was never far away.  He wandered miserably about the house and garden, smoking endless cigarettes, and invariably asking her with a piteous, dog-like wistfulness whenever they met if there were nothing that he could do.  There never was anything, but she had not the heart to tell him so, and she used to invent errands for him to make him happier.  She herself did not go beyond the garden for many days.

One evening, about three weeks after her baby’s death, Daisy heard his step on the gravel below her window and roused herself a little.

“Who is taking care of Blake?” she asked.

Muriel glanced down from where she sat at the great listless figure nearing the house.  “I think he is taking care of himself,” she said.

“All alone?” said Daisy.

“Yes, dear.”

Daisy uttered a sudden hard sigh.  “You mustn’t spend all your time with me any longer,” she said.  “I have been very selfish.  I forgot.  Go down to him, Muriel.”

Muriel looked up, struck by something incomprehensible in her tone.  “You know I like to be with you,” she said.  “And of course he understands.”

But Daisy would not be satisfied.  “That may be.  But—­but—­I want you to go to him.  He is lonely, poor boy.  I can hear it in his step.  I always know.”

Wondering at her persistence, and somewhat reluctant, Muriel rose to comply.  As she was about to pass her, with a swift movement Daisy caught her hand and drew her down.

“I want you—­so—­to be happy, dearest,” she whispered, a quick note of passion in her voice.  “It’s better for you—­it’s better for you—­to be together.  I’m not going to monopolise you any longer.  I will try to come down to-morrow, if Jim will let me.  It’s hockey day, isn’t it?  You must go and play as usual, you and he.”

She was quivering with agitation as she pressed her lips to the girl’s cheek.  Muriel would have embraced her, but she pushed her softly away.  “Go—­go, dear,” she insisted.  “I wish it.”

And Muriel went, seeing that she would not otherwise be pacified.

She found Blake depressed indeed, but genuinely pleased to see her, and she walked in the garden with him in the soft spring twilight till the dinner hour.

Just as they were about to go in, the postman appeared with foreign letters for them both, which proved to be from Sir Reginald and Lady Bassett.