ever said a single name to me, not
that I can call to mind, not except it was Durrant."

"Very well, then, M'riar! Now I come to my point.
Didn't--you--tell--me--a'most the very first time you did
anything--didn't you tell me Mrs. P. she said she was a _twin_. And Dave
he made enquiries."

"She _was_ a twin."

"I'm stumped," said Uncle Mo. "I was always groggy over the guessing of
co-nundrums. Now, miss--my lady--what does your ladyship make of it?"

"Let me read to the end," said Gwen. "It's not very long now. Then I'll
tell you." She read on and finished the letter, all but the postscript.
She was saying to herself:--"If I stick so over telling these good
people now, what will it be when the crisis comes?" It would be good
practice, anyhow, to drive it home to Aunt M'riar. When she had quite
finished what she meant to read, she went straight on, as she had
promised, ignoring obstacles:--"The explanation is that Mrs. Marrable
and Mrs. Prichard are twin sisters, who parted fifty years ago. About
five years later Mrs. Prichard was deceived by a forged letter, telling
her that her sister was drowned. My father and I found it among her
papers, and read it. This Mrs. Thrale who writes to me is her own
daughter, whom she left in England nearly fifty years since--a baby!...
And now she thinks her mother mad--her own mother!... Oh dear!--how will
they ever know? Who will tell them?"

A low whistle and a gasp respectively were all that Uncle Mo and Aunt
M'riar were good for. A reissue of the gasp might have become "Merciful
Gracious!" or some equivalent, if Uncle Mo had not nipped it in the bud,
thereby to provide a fulcrum for his own speech. "'Arf a minute, M'riar!
Your turn next. I want to be clear, miss--my lady--that I've got the
record ack-rate. These here two ladies have been twins all their lives,
unbeknown...." Uncle Mo was so bewildered that this amount of confusion
was excusable.

Gwen took his meaning, instead of criticizing his form. "Not _all_ their
lives," she said. "Fifty years ago they were thirty, and it's all
happened since then." She went over the ground again, not letting her
hearers off even the most incredible of the facts. She was surprised and
relieved to find that they seemed able to receive them, only noticing
that they appeared to lean on her superior judgment. They were
dumfoundered, of course; but they _could_ believe, with such a helper
for their unbelief. Were not the deep-rooted faiths of