ad seen
fit to complicate matters by vanishing without explanation; while his
mother, in an absurd maternal flurry of anxiety as to what had become of
him, must needs write to her as though it inevitably followed that she
was responsible for his disappearance!

Magda was conscious of an irritated sense of injury, which Gillian's
rather apprehensive little comments on the absence of further news
concerning young Raynham scarcely tended to allay.

"Oh, don't be tiresome, Gillian!" she exclaimed. "The boy's all right. I
expect he's been having a joy-day--which has prolonged itself a bit."

"It seems he hasn't been seen or heard of since the day before
yesterday," responded Gillian gravely. "They're afraid he may--may have
committed suicide"--she brought out the word with a rush. "They've been
dragging the lake at his home."

Magda flared.

"Where did you hear all this--this nonsense? You said nothing about it
last night."

"Lady Raynham told me. She rang up half an hour ago--before you were
down--to ask if by any chance we had had any news of him," replied
Gillian gently.

Magda pushed away her plate and, leaving her breakfast unfinished, moved
restlessly across to the window.

"There's nothing about it in this morning's paper, is there?" she asked.
Her tone sounded apprehensive.

Gillian's eyes grew suddenly compassionate.

"Yes. There is--something," she returned, laying her hand quickly over
the newspaper as though to withhold it.

But Magda swung round and snatched it from her. Gillian half rose from
her chair.

"Don't look--don't read it, Magda!" she entreated hastily.

The other made no response. Instead, she deliberately searched the
columns of the paper until she found a paragraph headed: Disappearance
of the Honourable Kit Raynham.

No exception could reasonably be taken to the paragraph in question. It
gave a brief resume of Kit Raynham's short life up to date, referred
to the distinguished career which had been predicted for him, and, in
mentioning that he was one of the set of brilliant young folks of whom
Magda Wielitzska, the well-known dancer, was the acknowledged leader,
it conveyed a very slightly veiled hint that he, in particular, was
accounted one of her most devoted satellites. The sting of the paragraph
lay in its tail:

"It will be tragic indeed if it should eventually transpire that a young
life so full of exceptional promise has foundered in seas that only a
seasoned swimmer