pped in
a cloth to put at her feet. Can you get them?"

The Baron bowed again, and went down the stairs. As Carmichael
returned to the bedroom he heard the droning, insistent voice below
calling "Gaspard, Gaspard!"

The great grey eyes were open as he entered the room, and there was a
sense of release from pain and fear in them that was like the deepest
kind of pleasure.

"Yes, I am much better," said she; "the attack has passed. Will it
come again? No? Not soon, you mean. Well, that is good. You need not
tell me what it is--time enough for that to-morrow. But come and sit
by me. I want to talk to you. Your first name is----"

"Leroy," he answered. "But you are weak; you must not talk much."

"Only a little," she replied, smiling; "it does me good. Leroy was
your mother's name--yes? It is not a Calvinton name. I wonder where
your father met her. Perhaps in France when he came to look for me.
But he did not find me--no, indeed--I was well hidden then--but he
found your mother. You are young enough to be my son. Will you be a
friend to me for your father's sake?"

She spoke gently, in a tone of infinite kindness and tender grace,
with pauses in which a hundred unspoken recollections and appeals were
suggested. The young man was deeply moved. He took her hand in his
firm clasp.

"Gladly," he said, "and for your sake too. But now I want you to
rest."

"Oh," she answered, "I am resting now. But let me talk a little more.
It will not harm me. I have been through so much! Twice married--a
great fortune to spend--all that the big world can give. But now I am
very tired of the whirl. There is only one thing I want--to stay here
in Calvinton. I rebelled against it once; but it draws me back. There
is a strange magic in the place. Haven't you felt it? How do you
explain it?"

"Yes," he said, "I have felt it surely, but I can't explain it, unless
it is a kind of ancient peace that makes you wish to be at home here
even while you rebel."

She nodded her head and smiled softly.

"That is it," she said, hesitating for a moment. "But my husband--you
see he is a very strong man, and he loves the world, the whirling
life--he took a dislike to this place at once. No wonder, with the
house in such a state! But I have plenty of money--it will be easy to
restore the house. Only, sometimes I think he cares more for the money
than--but no matter what I think. He wishes to go on at
once--to-morrow, if we can. I hate the thought