She was thankful when she came downstairs from Roger’s bedroom to find that there was no one about.  A meeting with Lady Gertrude at the moment would have been of all things the most repugnant to her.  With a feeling of intense thankfulness that the thin, steel-eyed woman was nowhere to be seen, she stepped into the car and was borne swiftly down the drive.  At the lodge, however, where the chauffeur had perforce to pull up while the lodge-keeper opened the gates, Isobel Carson came into sight, and common courtesy demanded that Nan should get out of the car and speak to her.  She had been gathering flowers—­for Roger’s room, was Nan’s involuntary thought—­and carried a basket, full of lovely blossoms, over her arm.

In a few words Nan told her of her interview with Roger.

Isobel listened intently.

“I’m glad you were willing to marry him,” she said abruptly, as Nan ceased speaking.  “It was—­decent of you.  Because, of course, you were never in love with him.”

“No,” Nan acknowledged simply.

“While I’ve loved him ever since I knew him!” burst out Isobel.  “But he’s never looked at me, thought of me like that!  Perhaps, now you’re out of the way—­” She broke off, leaving her sentence unfinished.

Into Nan’s mind flashed the possibility of all that this might mean—­this wealth of wasted love which was waiting for Roger if he cared to take it.

“Would you marry him—­now?” she asked.

“Marry him?” Isobel’s eyes glowed.  “I’d marry him if he couldn’t move a finger!  I love him!  And there’s nothing in the world I wouldn’t do for him.”

She looked almost beautiful in that moment, with her face irradiated by a look of absolute, selfless devotion.

“And I wouldn’t rest till he was cured!” The words came pouring from her lips.  “I’d try every surgeon, in the world before I’d give up hope, and if they failed, I’d try what love—­just patient, helpful love—­could do!  One thinks of a thousand ways which might cure when one loves,” she added.

“Love is a great Healer,” said Nan gently.  “I’m not sure that anything’s impossible if you have both love and faith.”  She paused, her foot on the step of the car.  “I think—­I think, some day, Roger will open the door of his heart to you, Isobel,” she ended softly.

She was glad to lean back in the car and to feel the cool rush of the air against her face.  She was tired—­immensely tired—­by the strain of the afternoon.  And now the remembrance came flooding back into her mind that, even though Roger had released her, she and Peter were still set apart—­no longer by the laws of God and man, but by the fact that she herself had destroyed his faith and belief in her.

She stepped wearily out of the car when it reached Mallow.  She was late in returning, and neither Kitty nor Penelope were visible as she entered the big panelled hall.  Probably they had already gone upstairs to dress for dinner.