k!" cried Caroline. "Aren't you going to stay with your aunts then?"

"I want to be independent," said Maggie slowly.

"Well!" said Caroline, amazed.

Could Maggie have seen just then into Miss Smith's mind and could she
only have realised that, with Miss Smith, every action and intention in
the human heart pivoted upon love-affairs and love-affairs only, she
might have been warned and have saved much later trouble. She was
intent on her own plans and was thinking of Caroline only as a possible
agent.

"Caroline," she asked, "would you take a note for me to some one?"

"Of course," said Caroline. "Who is it?"

"Martin Warlock," said Maggie.

At the name she suddenly blushed crimson. She knew that Caroline was
looking at her with eager curiosity. She suspected then that she had
done something foolish and would have given anything to recall her
words, but to recall them now seemed only to make it the more
suspicious.

"It's only something his sister wanted to know," she said casually. "I
thought you'd be seeing him soon. I hardly ever do."

"Yes, I'm going up there to-night," said Caroline staring at Maggie.
"Well, I'll give it you before you go," then she went on as casually as
she could. "What's been happening lately?"

"Of course you know all about the excitement," said Caroline sitting
back in the faded arm-chair with her blue dress spread all about her
like a cloud.

"What excitement?" said Maggie, pulling herself up, with a desperate
struggle, from her own private adventures.

"What! you don't know?" Caroline exclaimed in an awed whisper.

"Know what?" Maggie asked, rather crossly, repenting more and more of
asking Caroline to carry her note.

"Why, where DO you live? ... All about Mr. Warlock and his visions!"

"I've heard nothing at all," said Maggie.

This was unexpected joy to Caroline, who had never imagined that there
would be any one so near the Inner Saints as Maggie who yet knew
nothing about these recent events.

"Do you really know nothing about it?"

"Nothing," said Maggie.

"Aren't you wonderful?" said Caroline. "What happened was this. About
three weeks ago Mr. Warlock had a vision in the middle of the night. He
saw God at about three in the morning."

"How did he see God?" asked Maggie, awed in spite of herself.

Caroline's voice dropped to a mysterious whisper. "He just woke up and
there God was at the end of the bed. Of course he's not spoken to me
about it, but apparently