upplied them; she admitted that May had done her duty in persuading her
husband to yield a limited obedience to his doctors' orders. But she
looked disappointed, uninterested, dull; she awoke only for a sparkle of
malice, when she remarked how happy they would be together in the
country, with nothing to disturb them, nothing but just their two selves.

"Not as unhappy as you think," said May, smiling.

"All nonsense, I call it," pursued the old lady. "Sandro knew best; now
you've put notions into his head. Oh, I daresay you were bound to, my
dear."

"How can you be so blind?" murmured May. Aunt Maria shook her head
derisively; she was not blind, it was the wife and the doctors who were
blind. "You're not to say that sort of thing to Alexander," May went on
imperiously. Aunt Maria put her head on one side and smiled sardonically.

"You used to agree with me," she said. "Has the Mildmay woman been here
again?"

"No; she's at home. We shall see her perhaps at Henstead."

"Henstead! What are you going there for?"

"And you said you knew Alexander!" laughed May. "You don't suppose he's
going into retirement without a display of fireworks? The Henstead speech
is to be made. Then we put up the shutters--for a year at least, as I
say."

"That's something. Is he interested in it?"

"Oh, yes, working all day. But he's wonderfully well. I've never seen him
better." She hesitated and laughed a little. "How shall we ever stick to
our year?" she asked. "He means it now and I mean it. But----"

"You won't do it," said Aunt Maria emphatically. "Nobody could keep
Sandro quiet for a year!"

"Don't tell me that. We're going to try."

"Oh, I won't interfere, my dear. Try away. After all he'll be young
still, and they won't forget him in a year. Or if they do, he'll soon
make them remember him again."

The buoyant confidence was hard to resist. It seemed to grow greater in
face of all reason, and more and more to fill the old woman's mind as she
herself descended towards the grave which she scorned as a possibility
for Sandro. For now she was very small and frail, thin and yellow; she
too, like her nephew, seemed to hold on to life rather because she chose
of her arbitrary will, than thanks to any physical justification that she
could adduce. Could Quisante not only make himself live but make Aunt
Maria live too? Full of the influence of that last great moment, May,
laughing at herself, yet hesitated to answer "No." But the y