book
contained. It was placed at the very end, and under the title of
'Cancelled Words,' formed a whimsical and rather affecting love-lament,
somewhat in the tone of many of Sir Thomas Wyatt's poems. This was the
piece which had arrested Christopher's attention, and had been pointed
out by him to his sister Faith.

'It is very touching,' she said, looking up.

'What do you think I suspect about it--that the poem is addressed to me!
Do you remember, when father was alive and we were at Solentsea that
season, about a governess who came there with a Sir Ralph Petherwin and
his wife, people with a sickly little daughter and a grown-up son?'

'I never saw any of them. I think I remember your knowing something
about a young man of that name.'

'Yes, that was the family. Well, the governess there was a very
attractive woman, and somehow or other I got more interested in her than
I ought to have done (this is necessary to the history), and we used to
meet in romantic places--and--and that kind of thing, you know. The end
of it was, she jilted me and married the son.'

'You were anxious to get away from Solentsea.'

'Was I? Then that was chiefly the reason. Well, I decided to think no
more of her, and I was helped to do it by the troubles that came upon us
shortly afterwards; it is a blessed arrangement that one does not feel a
sentimental grief at all when additional grief comes in the shape of
practical misfortune. However, on the first afternoon of the little
holiday I took for my walking tour last summer, I came to Anglebury, and
stayed about the neighbourhood for a day or two to see what it was like,
thinking we might settle there if this place failed us. The next evening
I left, and walked across the heath to Flychett--that's a village about
five miles further on--so as to be that distance on my way for next
morning; and while I was crossing the heath there I met this very woman.
We talked a little, because we couldn't help it--you may imagine the kind
of talk it was--and parted as coolly as we had met. Now this strange
book comes to me; and I have a strong conviction that she is the writer
of it, for that poem sketches a similar scene--or rather suggests it; and
the tone generally seems the kind of thing she would write--not that she
was a sad woman, either.'

'She seems to be a warm-hearted, impulsive woman, to judge from these
tender verses.'

'People who print very warm words have sometimes very cold