I found Miss Hamilton alone, and she seemed very glad to see me; her fair face quite flushed with pleasure when she saw me enter the drawing-room.

‘I was afraid it was some stupid visitor,’ she said frankly, ’when I heard the door-bell ring.  Did it trouble you to come?  How tired you look! there, you shall take Giles’s chair,’ putting me with gentle force in a big blue-velvet chair that always stood by the fire; and then she took off my wraps and unfastened my gloves, and made me feel how glad she was to wait on me.

‘You are going away,’ I said, rather lugubriously, for I felt all at once how I should miss her.  She looked a little better and brighter, I thought, or was it only temporary excitement?

‘Yes,’ she returned seriously, but not sadly, ’I think it will be better.  I am almost glad to go away, except that I shall not see you,’ looking at me affectionately.

‘Oh, if you wish to go,’ for I was so relieved to hear her say this.

’It is not that I wish it, exactly, but that I feel it will be better:  things are so uncomfortable just now, more than usual, I think.  Etta seems always worrying herself and me; sometimes I fancy that she wants to get rid of me, that I am too troublesome,’ with a faint smile.  ’She worries about my health and want of spirits.  I suppose I am rather a depressing element in the house, and, as I get rather tired of all this fuss, I think it will be better to leave it behind for a little.’

‘That sounds as though you were driven away from home, Miss Hamilton.’

‘Miss Hamilton!’ reproachfully; ’that is naughty, Ursula.  I do not call you Miss Garston.’

‘Gladys, then.’

‘Perhaps my restlessness is driving me away,’ she returned sadly.  ’I do feel so restless without my work.  I never minded Etta’s fussiness so much.  I daresay she means it kindly, but it harasses me.  I am one of those reserved people who do not find it easy to talk of their feelings, bodily or mental, except to a chosen few.  You are one,—­perhaps not the only one.’

‘Of course not,’ for she hesitated.  ’You do not suppose that I laid such flattering unction to my soul?’

‘Oh, but I could tell you anything,’ she returned seriously.  ’You seem to draw out one’s thoughts while one is thinking them.  Yes, I am sorry to leave you even for a few weeks; but, for many reasons, Giles is right, and the change will be good for me.’

’If you will only come back looking better and brighter I will gladly let you go.’

‘I do not promise you that,’ she answered quickly, ’unless you remove the pressure of a very heavy burden; but I shall be quieter and more at peace, and I am very fond of Colonel and Mrs. Maberley:  they are dear people, and they spoil me dreadfully.’

‘I am thankful some one spoils you, Gladys.’

She smiled at that.

‘Uncle Max is still away,’ I observed, after a brief silence.  ’He went to Torquay to see an invalid friend, and he is still there.  Mr. Tudor does not expect him back until the end of next week.’