There was silence again, till Mrs. Grayson said, suddenly, with a strange passion:—­

‘But I’d rather be Jim’s mother, and be settin’ here without him, than I’d be the mother o’yan of them young fellows as is just gone!’

‘Yes,’ said Nelly slowly—­’yes.  If we think too much about keeping them safe—­just for ourselves—­If; they despise—­they would despise us.  And if anyone hangs back, we despise them.  It’ a horrible puzzle.’

‘We can pray for them,’ said Mrs. Grayson simply.  ’God can keep them safe if it’s His will.’

’Yes ’—­said Nelly again.  But her tone was flat and hesitating.  Her ever-present fear was very little comforted by prayer.  But she found comfort in Mrs. Grayson.  She liked to stay on in the old kitchen, watching Mrs. Grayson’s household ways, making friends with the stolid tabby cat, or listening to stories of Jim as a child.  Sometimes she would read parts of George’s letters to this new friend.  Bridget never cared to hear them; and she was more completely at ease with the farmer’s wife even than with Hester Martin.

But she could not linger this afternoon.  Her news might come any time.  And Sir William had telephoned that morning to say that he and his sister would call on their way from Windermere, and would ask for a cup of tea.  Marsworth would probably meet them at Rydal.

As she descended the lane, she scolded herself for ingratitude.  She was glad the Farrells were coming, because they would bring newspapers, and perhaps information besides, of the kind that does not get into newspapers.  But otherwise—­why had she so little pleasure now in the prospect of a visit from Sir William Farrell?  He had never forced himself upon them.  Neither his visits nor his lessons had been oppressively frequent, while the kindnesses which he had showered upon them, from a distance, had been unceasing.  She could hardly have explained her disinclination.  Was it that his company had grown so stimulating and interesting to her, that it made her think too much of other things than the war?—­and so it seemed to separate her from George?  Her own quiet occupations—­the needlework and knitting that she did for a neighbouring war workroom, the gathering and drying of the sphagnum moss, the visiting of a few convalescent soldiers, a daily portion of Wordsworth, and some books about him—­these things were within her compass George knew all about them, for she chronicled them in her letters day by day.  She had a happy peaceful sense of communion with him while she was busy with them.  But Farrell’s restless mind and wide culture at once tired and fascinated her.  He would often bring a volume of Shelley, or Pater, or Hardy, or some quite modern poet, in his pocket, and propose to read to her and Bridget, when the sketching was done.  And as he read, he would digress into talk, the careless audacity of which would sometimes distress or repel, and sometimes absorb her; till suddenly, perhaps, she realised how far she was wandering from that common ground where she and George had moved together, and would try and find her way back to it.  She was always learning some new thing; and she hated to learn, unless George changed and learnt with her.