"No. I'm tired of them: I'm not tired of you. This is the way for you to feel most how much I rest on you." Fleda had a compunction, wondering as they continued to stroll whether it was right after all to leave her. She believed, however, that if the flame might for the moment burn low, it was far from dying out; an impression presently confirmed by the way Mrs. Gereth went on: "But one's fatigue is nothing. The idea under which one worked kept one up. For you I could—I can still. Nothing will have mattered if she's not there." "What bearing have her feelings, pray?" Fleda asked.!

"She has proved it. Will you believe it if you see the letter?" Mrs. Gereth turned it over. "Well, I'll keep them, to try her," she finally pronounced; at which Fleda felt quite sick, as if she had given everything and got nothing.

"You'll last quite as long—" Here Fleda suddenly hesitated. "But if he knew that so well, what chance was there in it for her?" "He speaks to me of the only thing that concerns me. He gives me clear notice that he abates not one jot of his demand."