he sun's rays. I watched their courtship. It was some time
before he won her, and--Francis used to tell me all his hopes and
fears--I think I was some use to him at that time--a sort of
safety-valve." She gave a little whimsical smile. "It wasn't always
quite easy to listen to his rhapsodies about the girl he loved, but,
after all, it meant that we were together, and that was a great deal to
me. I do not think the world ever held any one more keen, more eager
than he was--so full of the joy of living, so ardent in his love. How
his whole face used to light up when he spoke of her! Every one loved
him, rich and poor alike. And then came his accident--you know all
about it?" Philippa made a gesture of assent. "And there, so far as I
am concerned, the story ended. All my remembrance lies in the happy
days when we were boy and girl together--when we grew to manhood and
womanhood almost before we realised it. I never spoke to him again--I
cannot say I did not see him, for I saw him driving once with Lady
Louisa. He did not know me."

"Have you never been to the High House since?"

"Only once. It was after I heard that Phil--that his engagement was
broken off. It is not a visit that I care to remember. I think I was
half crazed with grief for him. Anyway, I felt that I could bear it no
longer, and I went and practically forced myself into Lady Louisa's
presence. I did not know her very well, she was not the sort of woman
any one ever knew well--very cold in manner and reserved--and I had
always been afraid of her, but I forgot my fear that day. I have a
horrid recollection of being very foolish--of begging her upon my knees
to let me do some little thing, even the smallest, for him--and finally
of creeping out of the house humbled and despairing, with my whole
world in pieces. It had been pretty well shattered before that. I
don't know that Lady Louisa was unkind to me, but if she was she had
every excuse; and, poor soul, I know how she must have felt--like a
tigress defending her young. For it was then that all sorts of rumours
were rife about him. People said that he was hopelessly mad--that he
had tried to murder her--that he had been taken away to an asylum--and
heaven knows how many more lies. And of course she must have thought,
and with good reason, that I was an hysterical idiot. Well, I
quarrelled with my aunt over it--not the interview, she knew nothing of
that, but over the gossip. You ca