too what I did—­and how—­so does Sir James.  There is no place, no pardon for me on earth—­but you may still love me, Diana—­still love me—­and pray for me.  Oh, my little one!—­they brought you in to kiss me a little while ago—­and you looked at me with your blue deep eyes—­and then you kissed me—­so softly—­a little strangely—­with your cool lips—­and now I have made the nurse lift me up that I may write.  A few days—­perhaps even a few hours—­will bring me rest.  I long for it.  And yet it is sweet to be with your father, and to hear your little feet on the stairs.  But most sweet, perhaps, because it must end so soon.  Death makes these days possible, and for that I bless and welcome death.  I seem to be slipping away on the great stream—­so gently—­tired—­only your father’s hand.  Good-bye—­my precious Diana—­your dying—­and very weary

     “MOTHER.”

The words sank into Diana’s young heart.  They dulled the smart of her crushed love; they awakened a sense of those forces ineffable and majestic, terrible and yet “to be entreated,” which hold and stamp the human life.  Oliver had forsaken her.  His kiss was still on her lips.  Yet he had forsaken her.  She must stand alone.  Only—­in the spirit—­she put out clinging hands; she drew her mother to her breast; she smiled into her father’s eyes.  One with them; and so one with all who suffer!  She offered her life to those great Forces; to the hidden Will.  And thus, after three days of torture, agony passed into a trance of ecstasy—­of aspiration.

* * * * *

But these were the exaltations of night and silence.  With the returning day, Diana was again the mere girl, struggling with misery and nervous shock.  In the middle of the morning arrived a special messenger with a letter from Marsham.  It contained arguments and protestations which in the living mouth might have had some power.  That the living mouth was not there to make them was a fact more eloquent than any letter.  For the first time Diana was conscious of impatience, of a natural indignation.  She merely asked the messenger to say that “there was no answer.”

Yet, as they crossed London her heart fluttered within her.  One moment her eyes were at the window scanning the bustle of the streets; the next she would force herself to talk and smile with Muriel Colwood.

Mrs. Colwood insisted on dinner at the Charing Cross Hotel.  Diana submitted.  Afterward they made their way, along the departure platform, to the Dover-Calais train.  They took their seats.  Muriel Colwood knew—­felt it indeed, through every nerve—­that the girl with her was still watching, still hoping, still straining each bodily perception in a listening expectancy.

The train was very full, and the platform crowded with friends, luggage, and officials.  Upon the tumult the great electric lamps threw their cold ugly light.  The roar and whistling of the trains filled the vast station.  Diana, meanwhile, sat motionless in her corner, looking out, one hand propping her face.