st
outline could she discern the long French window that opened upon the
verandah.

The weeping continued. It was half smothered, but it sounded agonised.
A great wave of compassion swept suddenly over Muriel. All in a moment
she understood.

Swiftly she leaned forward into the darkness, feeling outwards till
her groping hands touched a figure that crouched beside the bed.

"Daisy! Daisy, my darling!" she said, and there was anguish in her own
voice. "What is it?"

In a second the sobbing ceased as if some magic had silenced it.
Two hands reached up out of the darkness and tightly clasped hers. A
broken voice whispered her name.

"What is it?" Muriel repeated in growing distress.

"Hush, dear, hush!" the trembling voice implored. "Don't let Will
hear! It worries him so."

"But, my darling,--" Muriel protested.

She began to feel for some matches, but again the nervous hands caught
and imprisoned hers.

"Don't--please!" Daisy begged her earnestly. "I--I have something to
tell you--something that will shock you unutterably. And I--I don't
want you to see my face."

She resisted Muriel's attempt to put her arms about her. "No--no,
dear! Hear me first. There! Let me kneel beside you. It will not
take me long. It isn't just for my own sake I am going to speak,
nor yet--entirely--for yours. You will see presently. Don't ask me
anything--please--till I have done. And then if--if there is anything
you want to know, I will try to tell you."

"Come and lie beside me," Muriel urged.

But Daisy would not. She had sunk very low beside the bed. For a while
she crouched there in silence while she summoned her strength.

Then, "Oh, Muriel," she suddenly said, and the words seemed to burst
from her with a great sigh, "I wonder if you ever really loved Blake."

"No, dear, I never did." Muriel's answer came quiet and sincere
through the darkness. "Nor did he love me. Our engagement was a
mistake. I was going to tell him so--if things had been different."

"I never thought you cared for him," Daisy said. "But oh, Muriel,
I did. I loved him with my whole soul. No, don't start! It is over
now--at least that part of it that was sinful. I only tell you of
it because it is the key to everything that must have puzzled you
so horribly all this time. We always loved each other from the very
beginning, but our people wouldn't hear of it because we were cousins.
And so we separated and I used to think that I had put it away from