hed the highest step, however, than he halted
incontinently. For, as though in direct response to the thoughts that
were filling his mind, a door on the corridor opened, and Clodagh
appeared.

Seeing him, she too paused; and in the moment of mutual hesitation he
had opportunity to study her.

In her new black dress, she looked slighter and more immature than he
had expected; and the pathetic effect of her appearance was enhanced by
the paleness of her face and the heavy, purple shadows that
sleeplessness and tears had traced below her eyes. As the impression
obtruded itself upon him, his own nervous excitement dropped from him
suddenly.

"My poor child!" he said involuntarily.

At the words and the tone, she turned to him impulsively.

"Oh! Mr. Milbanke----" she began.

Then her loneliness, her sense of bereavement and desolation, inundated
her mind. With a short sob, she moved abruptly away, and turning her
face to the wall, broke into a passion of tears.

The action was the action of a child; and without hesitation Milbanke
responded to it. Stepping across the corridor, he put his arm about her
shoulder and drew her gently towards the stairs.

"Come!" he said soothingly--"come! The house is quite quiet, and you
are badly in want of a little daylight and fresh air. Come! Let me take
you out."

Clodagh sobbed on; but she suffered herself to be led down the stairs
and across the hall towards the open door. There, however, she paused,
newly arrested by her grief.

"Oh, Mr. Milbanke," she cried, "I can't believe it! I can't believe
that we'll never see him again. Poor father! Oh, poor father!"

But Milbanke was equal to the situation.

"You must be brave," he said kindly. "You must remember that he would
like you to be brave."

The words were an inspiration; with marvellous efficacy they checked
the torrent of Clodagh's tears. For a moment she stood looking at him
in a dazed, uncertain way; then she lifted her head in a pathetic
attempt at decisive action.

"You are right," she said unevenly. "He _would_ like to know that I was
brave."

The declaration seemed to cost her an immense effort; for instantly it
was made, she turned away from Milbanke, freeing herself from his
detaining arm. And as though fearing to trust herself to any further
onrush of emotion, she stepped through the open door and walked quickly
forward to where the gravelled drive merged into the long and narrow
glen in which the Orristo