herself unable to think of anything
but him.

A panic seized her. She began to be afraid of herself. She caught
herself looking out of the windows and down the dusty summer roads, at
first unconsciously and then with a curious expectancy that grew to a
longing so real that she could not help but understand.

It came to Nanny with a terrible shock--the knowledge that at last she
loved a man. She remembered then the eyes of the men who had loved her
and whom she had so carelessly sent away. She understood then the hurt
they had carried away with them and hoped penitently that each had
found the comfort and love he had craved.

She wondered how and where she was to look for comfort. She saw with
something very much like horror that, unlike the men who had sought
her, she dared make no plea, could not by word or look give any sign of
what had befallen her.

If others came to know, her misery would be unbearable. The terrible
thought came that perhaps Cynthia's son might come to see. At that the
earth seemed to go soft beneath her feet and her world lay blurred in a
mist of amazed misery.

She was wretched and gay by turns. The day came when her father and
brother noticed this and spoke of it. Then it was that Nanny turned
white and walked away to Grandma Wentworth's. She had half a mind to
tell Grandma and perhaps through that wonder-wise soul find her way
back to peace and sanity. But Grandma had teased too and so Nanny held
on desperately to her secret, wondering how she was to go on enduring.

When she came to the picture of the little, grave-eyed chap Nanny stole
it without a moment's hesitation. And it acted like a charm. Lying
warm above her heart it dulled the longing and helped her to laugh
again, gayly, saucily even.

She had brave minutes when with her eyes on the picture she told
herself that it wasn't the man she loved but this grave-eyed boy in him
that had never grown up or died. She had always loved children, she
told herself, so there was no shame in that. But the next minute her
heart would call up the image of this boy grown up, a boy still, but a
boy with a man's eyes and a man's dormant strength. Being an honest
soul Nanny flushed and cried for the mother she could not remember.

Still as the days went by Nanny found that the little fellow stood
gallantly by her. Somehow he helped her to grow used to the pain and
the burning joy of her secret. He helped her to endure the questi