lack cloak that hung like a
cassock almost to her ankles and had always enveloped her hitherto.

Jimbo stared. Falling from her shoulders, and folding over her hips, he
saw long red feathers clinging to her; and when he dashed forward to
touch them with his hands, he found they were just as sleek and smooth
and glossy as his own.

"And you never told me all this time?" he gasped.

"It was safer not," she said. "You'd have been stroking and feeling your
shoulders the whole time, and the wings might never have come at all."

She spread out her wings as she spoke to their full extent; they were
nearly six feet across, and the deep crimson on the under side was so
exquisite, gleaming in the sunlight, that Jimbo ran in and nestled
beneath the feathers, tickling his cheeks with the fluffy surface and
running his fingers with childish delight along the slender red quills.

"You precious child," she said, tenderly folding her wings round him
and kissing the top of his head. "Always remember that I really love
you; no matter what happens, remember that, and I'll save you."

"And we shall escape together?" he asked, submitting for once to the
caresses with a good grace.

"We shall escape from the Empty House together," she replied evasively.
"How far we can go after that depends--on you."

"On me?"

"If you love me enough--as I love you, Jimbo--we can never separate
again, because love ties us together for ever. Only," she added, "it
must be mutual."

"I love you very much," he said, puzzled a little. "Of course I do."

"If you've really forgiven me for being the cause of your coming here,"
she said, "we can always be together, but----"

"I don't remember, but I've forgiven you--that _other you_--long ago,"
he said simply. "If you hadn't brought me here, I should never have met
you."

"That's not real forgiveness--quite," she sighed, half to herself.

But Jimbo could not follow this sort of conversation for long; he was
too anxious to try his wings for one thing.

"Is it _very_ difficult to use them?" he asked.

"Try," she said.

He stood in the centre of the floor and raised them again and again.
They swept up easily, meeting over his head, and the air whistled
musically through them. Evidently, they had their proper muscles, for it
was no great effort, and when he folded them again by his side they fell
into natural curves over his arms as if they had been there all his
life. The sound of the feathers thres