She had restlessly left her chair before the dressing-table, and was walking to and fro.  She paused and stood looking down at the carpet, though she scarcely saw it.

“Nothing matters but one thing—­one person,” she owned to herself aloud.  “I suppose it is always like this.  Rosy, Ughtred, even father and mother—­everyone seems less near than they were.  It is too strong—­too strong.  It is——­” the words dropped slowly from her lips, “the strongest thing—­in the world.”

She lifted her face and threw out her hands, a lovely young half-sad smile curling the deep corners of her mouth.  “Sometimes one feels so disdained,” she said—­“so disdained with all one’s power.  Perhaps I am an unwanted thing.”

But even in this case there were aids one might make an effort to give.  She went to her writing-table and sat thinking for some time.  Afterwards she began to write letters.  Three or four were addressed to London—­one was to Mr. Penzance.

. . . . .

Mount Dunstan and his vicar were walking through the village to the vicarage.  They had been to the hop pickers’ huts to see the people who were ill of the fever.  Both of them noticed that cottage doors and windows were shut, and that here and there alarmed faces looked out from behind latticed panes.

“They are in a panic of fear,” Mount Dunstan said, “and by way of safeguard they shut out every breath of air and stifle indoors.  Something must be done.”

Catching the eye of a woman who was peering over her short white dimity blind, he beckoned to her authoritatively.  She came to the door and hesitated there, curtsying nervously.

Mount Dunstan spoke to her across the hedge.

“You need not come out to me, Mrs. Binner.  You may stay where you are,” he said.  “Are you obeying the orders given by the Guardians?”

“Yes, my lord.  Yes, my lord,” with more curtsys.

“Your health is very much in your own hands,” he added.

“You must keep your cottage and your children cleaner than you have ever kept them before, and you must use the disinfectant I sent you.  Keep away from the huts, and open your windows.  If you don’t open them, I shall come and do it for you.  Bad air is infection itself.  Do you understand?”

“Yes, my lord.  Thank your lordship.”

“Go in and open your windows now, and tell your neighbours to do the same.  If anyone is ill let me know at once.  The vicar and I will do our best for everyone.”

By that time curiosity had overcome fear, and other cottage doors had opened.  Mount Dunstan passed down the row and said a few words to each woman or man who looked out.  Questions were asked anxiously and he answered them.  That he was personally unafraid was comfortingly plain, and the mere sight of him was, on the whole, an unexplainable support.

“We heard said your lordship was going away,” put in a stout mother with a heavy child on her arm, a slight testiness scarcely concealed by respectful good-manners.  She was a matron with a temper, and that a Mount Dunstan should avoid responsibilities seemed highly credible.