The light of the lamp roused the woman.  She made a sign to Miss Alcott to lift her a little.

“Not much,” said the Rector’s sister in Buntingford’s ear.  “It’s the heart that’s wrong.”

Together they raised her just a little.  Miss Alcott put a fan into Buntingford’s hands, and opened the windows wider.

“I’m all right,” said the stranger irritably.  “Let me alone.  I’ve got a lot to say.”  She turned her eyes on Buntingford.  “Do you want to know—­about Rocca?”

“Yes.”

“He died seven years ago.  He was always good to me—­awfully good to me and to the boy.  We lived in a horrible out-of-the-way place—­up in the mountains near Naples.  I didn’t want you to know about the boy.  I wanted revenge.  Rocca changed his name to Melegrani.  I called myself Francesca Melegrani.  I used to exhibit both at Naples and Rome.  Nobody ever found out who we were.”

“What made you put that notice in the Times?”

She smiled faintly, and the smile recalled to him an old expression of hers, half-cynical, half-defiant.

“I had a pious fit once—­when Rocca was very ill.  I confessed to an old priest—­in the Abruzzi.  He told me to go back to you—­and ask your forgiveness.  I was living in sin, he said—­and would go to hell.  A dear old fool!  But he had some influence with me.  He made me feel some remorse—­about you—­only I wouldn’t give up the boy.  So when Rocca got well and was going to Lyons, I made him post the notice from there—­to the Times.  I hoped you’d believe it.”  Then, unexpectedly, she slightly raised her head, the better to see the man beside her.

“Do you mean to marry that girl I saw on the lake?”

“If you mean the girl that I was rowing, she is the daughter of a cousin of mine.  I am her guardian.”

“She’s handsome.”  Her unfriendly eyes showed her incredulity.

He drew himself stiffly together.

“Don’t please waste your strength on foolish ideas.  I am not going to marry her, nor anybody.”

“You couldn’t—­till you divorce me—­or till I die,” she said feebly, her lids dropping again—­“but I’m quite ready to see any lawyers—­so that you can get free.”

“Don’t think about that now, but tell me again—­what you want me to do.”

“I want—­to go to—­America.  I’ve got friends there.  I want you to pay my passage—­because I’m a pauper—­and to take over the boy.”

“I’ll do all that.  You shall have a nurse—­when you are strong enough—­who will take you across.  Now I must go.  Can you just tell me first where the boy is?”

Almost inaudibly she gave an address in Kentish Town.  He saw that she could bear no more, and he rose.

“Try and sleep,” he said in a voice that wavered.  “I’ll see you again to-morrow.  You’re all right here.”

She made no reply, and seemed again either asleep or unconscious.