ertainment, and Madam Fulton was clapping her
unwearied hands as if things could go on forever. Grant her an encore,
and she would demand another. As for him, he would fain go home to bed.
But Billy was a man of his word. His loyal heart could not allow itself
to recognize the waywardness of his sad mind. The one had done with life
in all but its outer essences. The other, in human decency, must go on
swearing the old vows to the last. His face took on a resolution that
made him more the man, and sobered her. He put out his hand.

"Will you come, Florrie?" he asked.

"Yes, Billy," she answered. "I'll come."

"You honor me very much." He sat there holding the frail hand and
wondering at himself, wondering at them both. If he had known he was to
go back in this guise, he might not have had the courage to come. But it
was well. It was a good thing, having missed many ventures, not to let
this one pass. Madam Fulton was having one of her moments of a renewed
grasp on life, a gay delight in it which was a matter of nerves and
quite distinct from memory or hope. She was discoursing gleefully.

"We won't tell Electra."

"Not if you'd rather not."

"She shall sail, and we'll sail after her. We'll send her cards from
London. My stars, Billy! do you think we're mad?"

"You may be," said Billy. "As for me, I'm a great hand at a bargain."

And while there were flutterings of wings before sailing, Osmond bent
over his ground and delved and thought. His brows were knitted. He
hardly saw the earth or his fellow workmen, but answered mechanically
when men came for orders, and went on riving up the earth, as if it were
his enemy, and then smoothing it in tenderest friendliness.

XXX

Rose and grannie had been living in an atmosphere of calm. Something was
not determined yet, and they had to wait for it. Osmond had not come to
the house for his early calls on grannie, and Rose, awake in her room to
hear his step, at least, listened for it with a miserable certainty of
disappointment. Every morning she gave a quick look of inquiry as she
and grannie met, and the old lady would say,--

"No, dear, no!"

She sickened mentally under the delay, and at last her heart began to
ask her whether he would ever see her again. On the day she told grannie
that she was going to Paris to settle MacLeod's estate, grannie said,--

"That's right. But you'll come back."

"I must come back. You must let me." It was a great cry out of a