e
remembered him, and should seek thus with loathing to thrust him out
of her life?

Involuntarily the man's hands clenched and his blood quickened. Had
the General's trust been misplaced? Was Nick a blackguard?

Finding her eyes still upon him, he made her a slight bow that was
wholly free from gallantry.

"I will remember your wish, Miss Roscoe," he said. "I am sorry I
mentioned a painful subject to you, though I am glad for you to know
the truth. You are not vexed with me, I hope?"

Her eyes shone with sincere friendliness. "I am not vexed," she
answered. "Only--let me forget--that's all."

And in those few words she voiced the desire of her soul. It was her
one longing, her one prayer--to forget. And it was the one thing of
all others denied to her.

In the silence that followed, she was conscious of his warm and kindly
sympathy, and she was grateful for it, though something restrained her
from telling him so.

Daisy, coming lightly in upon them, put an end to their tete-a-tete.
She entered softly, her face alight and tender, and laid her two hands
upon Grange's great shoulders as he sat before the fire.

"Come upstairs, Blake," she whispered, "and see my baby boy. He's
sleeping so sweetly. I want you to see him first while he's good."

He raised his face to her smiling, his hands on hers. "I am sure to
admire anything that belongs to you, Daisy," he said.

"You're a dear old pal," responded Daisy lightly. "Come along."

When they were gone Muriel spied Will Musgrave's letter lying on
the ground by Grange's chair as it had evidently fallen from Daisy's
dress. She went over and picked it up. It was still unopened.

With an odd little frown she set it up prominently upon the
mantelpiece.

"Does Love conquer after all?" she murmured to herself, and there was
a faint twist of cynicism about her lips as she asked the question.
There seemed to be so many forms of Love.

CHAPTER XIX

A HERO WORSHIPPER

"Well played! Oh, well played! Miss Roscoe, you're a brick."

The merry voice of the doctor's little daughter Olga, aged fourteen,
shrilled across the hockey-ground, keen with enthusiasm. She was
speeding across the field like a hare to congratulate her latest
recruit.

"I'm so pleased!" she cried, bursting through the miscellaneous crowd
of boys and girls that surrounded Muriel. "I wanted you to shoot that
goal."

She herself had been acting as goal-keeper at her own end of the
field, a po