e.
Couldn't it possibly help--even a faith-cure?' She leant forward
impulsively, her voice trembling, anal her eyes still shining beneath
their faint, melancholy smile.

'I fear, my dear...it cannot be. He longs to see you. But with his mind,
you know, in this state, it might--?'

'But mother never told me,' broke in the girl desperately, 'there was
anything wrong with his MIND. Oh, but that was quite unfair. You don't
mean, you don't mean--that--?'

Lawford scanned swiftly the little square beloved and memoried room that
fate had suddenly converted for him into a cage of unspeakable pain
and longing. 'Oh no; believe me, no! Not his brain, not that, not even
wandering; really: but always thinking, always longing on and on for
you, dear, only. Quite, quite master of himself, but--'

'You talk,' she broke in again angrily, 'only in pretence! You are
treating me like a child; and so does mother, and so it has been ever
since I came home. Why, if mother can, and you can, why may not I? Why,
if he can walk and talk in the night....'

'But who--who "can walk and talk in the night?"' inquired a low stealthy
voice out of the quietness behind her.

Alice turned swiftly. Her mother was standing at a little distance, with
all the calm and moveless concentration of a waxwork figure, looking up
at her from the staircase.

'I was--I was talking to Dr Ferguson, mother.'

'But as I came up the stairs I understood you to be inquiring something
of Dr Ferguson, "if," you were saying, "he can walk and talk in the
night": you surely were not referring to your father, child? That could
not possibly be, in his state. Dr Ferguson, I know, will bear me out
in that at least. And besides, I really must insist on following out
medical directions to the letter. Dr Ferguson I know, will fully concur.
Do, pray, Dr Ferguson,' continued Sheila, raising her voice even now
scarcely above a rapid murmur--'do pray assure my daughter that she must
have patience; that however much even he himself may desire it, it is
impossible that she should see her father yet. And now, my dear child,
come down, I want to have a moment's talk with Dr Ferguson. I feared
from his beckoning at the window that something was amiss.'

Alice turned, dismayed, and looked steadily, almost with hostility,
at the stranger, so curiously transfixed and isolated in her small old
play-room. And in this scornful yet pleading confrontation her eye fell
suddenly on the pin in his