She was still pale but self-possessed, and wonderfully pretty in her fur jacket and toque; and as she stood there, both hands dropped into his, that nameless and winning grace which had always fascinated him held him now—­something about her that recalled the child in the garden with clustering hair and slim, straight limbs.

“You look about fifteen,” he said, “you beautiful, slender thing!  Did you come to see my father?”

“Yes—­and your father’s son.”

[Illustration:  “Crumpled up like a white flower in his arms.”]

“Me?”

“Is there another like you, Duane—­in all the world?”

“Plenty——­”

“Hush!...  When did you go last night?”

“When you left me for the land of dreams, little lady.”

“So you—­carried me.”

He smiled, and a bright flush covered her cheeks.

“That makes twice,” she said steadily.

“Yes, dear.”

“There will be no third time.”

“Not unless I have a sleepy wife who nods before the fire like a drowsy child.”

“Do you want that kind?”

“I want the kind that lay close in my arms before the fire last night.”

“Do you?  I think I should like the sort of husband who is strong enough to cradle that sort of a child....  Could your mother and Naida receive me?  Could I see your father?”

“Yes.  When are you going back to Roya-Neh?”

“To-night.”

He said quietly:  “Is it safe?”

“For me to go?  Yes—­yes, my darling”—­her hands tightened over his—­“yes, it is safe—­because you made it so.  If you knew—­if you knew what is in my heart to—­to give you!—­what I will be to you some day, dearest of men——­”

He said unsteadily:  “Come upstairs....  My father is very feeble, but quite cheerful.  Do you understand that—­that his mind—­his memory, rather, is a little impaired?”

She lifted his hands and laid her soft lips against them: 

“Will you take me to him, Duane?”

Colonel Mallett lay in the pale November sunlight, very still, his hands folded on his breast.  And at first she did not know him in this ghost of the tall, well-built, gray-haired man with ruddy colour and firm, clear skin.

As she bent over, he opened his eyes, smiled, pronounced her name, still smiling and keeping his sunken eyes on her.  They were filmy and bluish, like the eyes of the very old; and the hand she lifted and held was the stricken hand of age—­inert, lifeless, without weight.

She said that she was so happy to know he was recovering; she told him how proud everybody was of Duane, what exceptional talent he possessed, how wonderfully he had painted Miller’s children.  She spoke to him of Roya-Neh, and how interesting it had become to them all, told him about the wild boar and her own mishaps with the guileful pig.

He smiled, watching her at times; but his wistful gaze always reverted to his son, who sat at the foot of the couch, chin balanced between his long, lean hands.