re at any moment she might
behold him approaching? She knew she had not, and for one wild moment
wondered if she could dare still further; deliberately disappear,
deliberately _stay_ away until Bernard was forced to depart alone, but
even while one by one the questions raced through her brain she
continued to drag wearily up the great staircase. Here was an
illustration of the greater struggle on a lesser plane. Her heart was
vagrant, panting to escape, but the chains of duty held. Bernard was
her husband; he was in trouble; he demanded her help; at whatever cost
to herself that help must be given.

Cassandra gave instructions to her maid, and retired to her boudoir to
send a telephone message to the one person in Chumley who would come to
her aid. Grizel was at home, and her voice came over the wire clear and
distinct.

"Yes, it's me. I'm alone. What is it?"

Cassandra's words came haltingly. Her proud spirit had difficulty in
framing that message.

"This is Wednesday... Wednesday afternoon. You remember what was to
happen on Wednesday afternoon?... Bernard has just had a wire to say
that his mother has had a stroke. He is going to her at once--we are
both going. He says I am to nurse her... We leave in--er--in a quarter
of an hour... Grizel! I... I was just starting for the summer-house,
when he met me with this news. There is no time for--anything... Will
_you_ explain?"

Grizel's voice came back in instant reassurement.

"Cassandra, I will! Leave it to me... Cassandra, darling, _how_ long
are you to be away?"

"I don't know. How should I? Goodness knows!" cried Cassandra
bitterly.

Like a faint, sweet echo came back the words in Grizel's deepest tones:

"Goodness knows!"

CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.

FAREWELL!

The old Mater was not unconscious. The mysterious physical lightning
had smitten the left side of the body, left a drawn, disfigured face,
and a helpless arm and leg, but the spirit within was untouched. By the
time that her son arrived, the old Mater had realised what had happened
to her, and was seething with bitterness and rebellion. It was a
terrible sight to see the blaze of the living eye in the dead face; a
piteous thing to listen to the mumbled words which proceeded from the
twisted lips.

The tears came into the Squire's eyes as he stood by his mother's bed,
he knelt on the floor beside her, and stroked her brow with his big
sunburnt hand; with extraordinary