can't be too particular." He was thankful, at any rate, that
he would have an opportunity before long--for he was going straight home
and to Cumberland--of putting Mrs. Gaddesden on her guard. "I may be
thought officious; Lady Merton let me see very plainly that she thinks
me so--but I shall do my duty nevertheless."

And as he stood over his packing, bewildering his valet with a number of
precise and old-maidish directions, his sore mind ran alternately on the
fiasco of his own journey and on the incredible folly of nice women.

Delaine departed; and for two days Elizabeth ministered to Anderson. She
herself went strangely through it, feeling between them, as it were,
the bared sword of his ascetic will--no less than her own terrors and
hesitations. But she set herself to lift him from the depths; and as
they walked about the mountains and the forests, in a glory of summer
sunshine, the sanity and sweetness of her nature made for him a
spiritual atmosphere akin in its healing power to the influence of pine
and glacier upon his physical weariness.

On the second evening, Mariette walked into the hotel. Anderson, who had
just concluded all arrangements for the departure of the car with its
party within forty-eight hours, received him with astonishment.

"What brings you here?"

Mariette's harsh face smiled at him gravely.

"The conviction that if I didn't come, you would be committing a folly."

"What do you mean?"

"Giving up your Commissionership, or some nonsense of that sort."

"I have given it up."

"H'm! Anything from Ottawa yet?"

It was impossible, Anderson pointed out, that there should be any letter
for another three days. But he had written finally and did not mean to
be over-persuaded.

Mariette at once carried him off for a walk and attacked him
vigorously. "Your private affairs have nothing whatever to do with your
public work. Canada wants you--you must go."

"Canada can easily get hold of a Commissioner who would do her more
credit," was the bitter reply. "A man's personal circumstances are part
of his equipment. They must not be such as to injure his mission."

Mariette argued in vain.

As they were both dining in the evening with Elizabeth and Philip, a
telegram was brought in for Anderson from the Prime Minister. It
contained a peremptory and flattering refusal to accept his resignation.
"Nothing has occurred which affects your public or private character. My
confidence quite unchange