t _him_ in the world, and
I sometimes wish they'd had their way. If he wasn't here--or if he was
dead--I believe I could be happier. I shouldn't be forever worrying
about him. I shouldn't have him on my mind. I often wonder if it's--if
it's love I feel for him--or only an agonizing sense of
responsibility."

The door being open Walter Wildgoose waddled to the threshold, where
he stood with his right hand clasped in his left. "Mr. Steptoe at Mr.
Allerton's to speak to Miss Barbara on the telyphone, please."

Barbara gasped. "Oh, Lord! I wonder what it is now!"

Left to herself Miss Walbrook resumed her scanning of the paper, but
she resumed it with the faintest quiver of a smile on her thin,
cleanly-cut lips. It was the kind of smile which indicates patient
hope, or the anticipation of something satisfactory.

"Oh!"

The exclamation was so loud as to be heard all the way from the
telephone, which was in another part of the house. Miss Walbrook let
the paper fall, sat bolt upright, and listened.

"Oh! Oh!"

It was like a second, and repeated, explosion. Miss Walbrook rose to
her feet; the paper rustled to the floor.

"Oh! Oh!"

The sound was that which human beings make when the thing told them is
more than they can bear. Barbara cried out as if someone was beating
her with clubs, and she was coming to her knees.

She was not coming to her knees. When her aunt reached her she was
still standing by the little table in the hall which held the
telephone, on which she had hung up the receiver. She supported
herself with one hand on the table, as a woman does when all she can
do is not to fall senseless.

"It's--it's Rash," she panted, as she saw her aunt appear. "Somebody
has--has killed him."

Miss Walbrook stood with hands clasped, like one transfixed. "He's
dead?--after all?"

Barbara nodded, tearlessly. She could stammer out the words, but no
more. "Yes--all but!"

* * * * *

In the flat at Red Point there was another and dissimilar breakfast
scene. For the first time in her life Letty was having coffee and
toast in bed. The window was open, and between the muslin curtains,
which puffed in the soft May wind, she could see the ocean with
steamers and ships on it.

The room was tiny, but it was spotless. Everything was white, except
where here and there it was tied up with a baby-blue ribbon. Anything
that could be tied with a baby-blue ribbon was so tied.