t soften what, after all, could not be
softened. 'M. de Chateauvieux sent me to you at once, that you should
not hear in any other way. But it must be a shock to you--for you loved
her!'

'Oh!' she cried, interrupting him, speaking in short, gasping words, and
answering not so much his words as his look. 'She is ill--she is in
danger--something has happened?'

'I was summoned on Wednesday,' said Kendal, helpless after all in the
grip of the truth which would not be managed or controlled. 'When I got
there she had been two days ill, and there was no hope.'

He paused; her eyes of agonised questioning implored him to go on. 'I was
with her six hours--after I came she had no pain--it was quite peaceful,
and--she died in the evening.'

She had been watching him open-eyed, every vestige of colour fading from
cheek and lip; when he stopped, she gave a little cry. He let go her
hand, and she sank into a chair near, so white and breathless that he was
alarmed.

'Shall I get you water--shall I ring?' he asked after a moment or two,
bending over her.

'No,' she whispered with difficulty; 'let me alone--just for a minute.'

He left her side, and stood leaning against the mantelpiece, waiting
anxiously. She struggled against the physical oppression which had seized
upon her, and fought it down bravely. But he noticed with a pang now that
the flush was gone, that she looked fragile and worn, and, as his thought
went back for a moment to the Surrey Sunday and her young rounded beauty
among the spring green, he could have cried out in useless rebellion
against the unyielding physical conditions which press upon and imprison
the flame of life.

At last the faintness passed off, and she sat up, her hands clasped round
her knees, and the tears running fast over her cheeks. Her grief was like
herself--frank, simple, expressive.

'Will you tell me more about it? Oh, I cannot believe it! Why, only last
week when I was ill she talked of coming to me! I have just been writing
to her--there is my letter. I feel as if I could not bear it; she was
like a mother to me in Paris. Oh, if I could have seen her!'

'You were one of her chief thoughts at the last,' said Kendal, much
moved. And he went on to tell her the story of Marie's dying hours,
describing that gentle withdrawal from life with a manly tenderness of
feeling and a quick memory for all that could soften the impression of it
to the listener. And then he brought out the minia