rishing," said I.

"And Doria?"

"At Northlands."

"She knows I'm coming?"

"Yes," said I.

Liosha joined us, accompanied by a porter, carrying their exiguous
baggage. We walked to the exit, without saying much, and settled
ourselves in the limousine, my guests in the back seat, I on one of the
little chairs facing them. We started.

"My dear old chap," said I, leaning forward. "I've got something to tell
you. I didn't like to write about it. But it has got to be told, and I
may as well get it over now."

* * * * *

It was a subdued and half-scared Jaffery who greeted Barbara and Susan
at our front door. The jollity had gone out of him. He was nothing but a
vast hulk filled with self-reproach. It was his fault, his very grievous
and careless fault for having postponed the destruction of the papers,
and for having left them loose and unsecured in his rooms. He all but
beat his breast. If Doria had died of the shock his would be the blame.
He saluted Barbara with the air of one entering a house of mourning.

"You mustn't look so woe-begone," she said. "Something like this was
bound to happen. I have dreaded it all along--and now it has happened
and the earth hasn't come to an end."

We stood in the hall, while Franklin divested the visitors of their
outer wraps and trappings.

"And, Liosha," Barbara continued, throwing her arms round as much of
Liosha as they could grasp--she had already kissed her a warm
welcome--"it's a shame, dear, to depress you the moment you come into
the place. You'll wish you were at sea again."

"I guess not," said Liosha. "I know now I'm among folks who love me.
Isn't that true, Susan?"

"Daddy loves you and mummy loves you and I adore you," cried Susan.

Whereupon there was much hugging of a spoiled monkey.

We went upstairs. At the drawing-room door Barbara gave me one of her
queer glances, which meant, on interpretation, that I should leave her
alone with Jaffery for a few minutes so that she could pour the balm of
sense over his remorseful soul, and that in the meantime it would be
advisable for me to explain the situation to Liosha. Aloud, she said,
before disappearing:

"Your old room, Liosha, dear--you'll find everything ready."

In order to carry out my wife's orders, I had to disentangle Susan from
Liosha's embrace and pack her off rueful to the nursery. But the promise
to seat her at lunch between the two seafarers brought a measure