putable master of her
heart.

Dr. Knott came to see her, too, almost daily--rough, tender-hearted,
humorous, dependable, never losing sight, in his intercourse with her,
of the matter in hand, of the thing which immediately is.

Thus did these three men, each according to his nature and capacity,
strive to guard the poor Hart, pasturing before the quaint pavilion,
set--for its passing refreshment--in the midst of the Forest of This
Life, and to keep, just so long as was possible, the pursuing Leopard
at bay. Nevertheless the Leopard gained, despite of their faithful
guardianship--which was inevitable, the case standing as it did.

For one bright afternoon, about three o'clock, Mrs. Denny arrived in
the gun-room, where Ormiston sat smoking, while talking over with
Julius the turf-cutting claims of certain squatters on Spendle
Flats---arrived, not to summon the latter to further readings of the
great Elizabethan poet, but to say to the former:--

"Will you please come at once, sir? Her ladyship is sitting up. She is
a little difficult about the baby--only, you know, sir, if I can say it
with all respect, in her pretty, teasing way. But I am afraid she must
be told."

And Roger rose and went--sick at heart. He would rather have faced an
enemy's battery, vomiting out shot and shell, than gone up the broad,
stately staircase, and by the silent, sunny passageways, to that
fragrant, white-paneled room.

On the stands and tables were bowls full of clear-coloured spring
flowers--early primrose, jonquil, and narcissus. A wood-fire burned
upon the blue-and-white tiled hearth. And on the sofa, drawn up at
right angles to it, Katherine sat, wrapped in a gray, silk
dressing-gown bordered with soft, white fur. She flushed slightly as
her brother came in, and spoke to him with an air of playful apology.

"I really don't know why you should have been dragged up here, just
now, dear old man," she said. "It is some fancy of Denny's. I'm afraid
in the excess of her devotion she makes me rather a nuisance to you.
And now, not contented with fussing about me, she has taken to being
absurdly mysterious about the baby----"

She stopped abruptly. Something in the young man's expression and
bearing impressed her, causing her to stretch out her hands to him in
swift fear and entreaty.

"Oh, Roger!" she cried, "Roger--what is it?"

And he told her, repeating, with but a few omissions, the statement
made to him by the doctor ten days a