Betty went with her in to Washington, and stayed with her until the train left.  Hawkins was the only one they encountered on their way out, and Mary took the proffered lunch-box with a smile that was very close to tears.  Her voice faltered over her words of thanks, and when she had been handed into the ’bus she dared not trust herself to look back at the faithful old servitor in the doorway.  Once, just as they swung around the curve that hid the beautiful grounds from sight, she leaned out for one more look, then hastily pulled down her veil.

At the station, as they sat waiting for her train, Betty said, “I’ll write every week and tell you all the news, but don’t feel that you must answer regularly.  I know how your time will be occupied.  But I should like a postal now and then, telling me how Jack is.  You know,” she went on, stooping to retie her shoe, “he and I have been corresponding for some time, and I think of him as one of my oldest and best friends.  I shall always be anxious for news of him.”

Betty could fairly feel the surprise in Mary’s face, even though she was stooping forward too far to see it, and she heard with inward amusement her astonished exclamations.  “Well, of all things!  I didn’t know you were writing to each other!  Jack never said a word about it, and yet he sent you a message nearly every time he wrote to me!”

She was still puzzling about it when her train was called, and she had to take leave of Betty.  All too soon the last familiar face was out of sight, and the long, lonely journey home was begun.

It was near the close of the third day’s journey when she remembered Phil’s book and took it out of its wrappings.  She was not in a reading humour, but time hung heavy, and he had said to open it when she reached the desert.  Besides, she was a trifle curious to see what kind of a book he had chosen for her.  It was a very small one.  She could soon skim through it.

“The Jester’s Sword” was the title.  Not a very attractive subject for any one in her mood, she thought.  It would be a sorry smile at best that the gayest of jesters could bring to her.  She turned the leaves listlessly, then sat up with an air of attention.  There on the title-page was a line from Stevenson, the very thing Madam Chartley had said to her the day she left Warwick Hall. “To renounce when that shall be necessary, and not be embittered.”

Phil had chosen wisely after all if his little tale were to tell her how to do it.  Then a paragraph on the first page claimed her attention. “Because he was born in Mars’ month, the bloodstone became his signet, sure token that undaunted courage would be the jewel of his soul.”

Why, she and Jack were both born in Mars’ month, and each had a bloodstone, and each had to answer to an awful call for courage.  It was dear of Phil to choose such an appropriate story.  Settling herself comfortably back in the seat, she began to read, never dreaming what a difference in all her after life the little tale was to make.