ut Gyp, when she read the
letter, said to Winton: "Dad, when it comes, don't send for him. I don't
want him here."

With those letters of his, she buried the last remnants of her feeling
that somewhere in him there must be something as fine and beautiful as
the sounds he made with his violin. And yet she felt those letters
genuine in a way, pathetic, and with real feeling of a sort.

From the moment she reached Mildenham, she began to lose that
hopelessness about herself; and, for the first time, had the sensation of
wanting to live in the new life within her. She first felt it, going
into her old nursery, where everything was the same as it had been when
she first saw it, a child of eight; there was her old red doll's house,
the whole side of which opened to display the various floors; the worn
Venetian blinds, the rattle of whose fall had sounded in her ears so many
hundred times; the high fender, near which she had lain so often on the
floor, her chin on her hands, reading Grimm, or "Alice in Wonderland," or
histories of England. Here, too, perhaps this new child would live
amongst the old familiars. And the whim seized her to face her hour in
her old nursery, not in the room where she had slept as a girl. She
would not like the daintiness of that room deflowered. Let it stay the
room of her girlhood. But in the nursery--there was safety, comfort!
And when she had been at Mildenham a week, she made Betty change her
over.

No one in that house was half so calm to look at in those days as Gyp.
Betty was not guiltless of sitting on the stairs and crying at odd
moments. Mrs. Markey had never made such bad soups. Markey so far
forgot himself as frequently to talk. Winton lamed a horse trying an
impossible jump that he might get home the quicker, and, once back, was
like an unquiet spirit. If Gyp were in the room, he would make the
pretence of wanting to warm his feet or hand, just to stroke her shoulder
as he went back to his chair. His voice, so measured and dry, had a ring
in it, that too plainly disclosed the anxiety of his heart. Gyp, always
sensitive to atmosphere, felt cradled in all the love about her.
Wonderful that they should all care so much! What had she done for
anyone, that people should be so sweet--he especially, whom she had so
grievously distressed by her wretched marriage? She would sit staring
into the fire with her wide, dark eyes, unblinking as an owl's at
night--wondering what she