tion, and the question received its answer. If ever a man's eyes
expressed appeal, Dane's expressed it at that moment. With all the
intensity which eyes could express, he threw himself at her mercy.

"I think," said Cassandra clearly, "Captain Peignton had better stay.
It will be quicker in the end. Teresa must come up and amuse him here."
She laid her hand on the girl's arm with a kindly pressure. "You will
stay and look after him now, till my husband finds Jevons. There is an
old carrying chair in the box-room, which will get over the difficulty
of the stairs. Mrs Mallison! shall we lead the way to tea?"

The next moment the room was empty save for the engaged pair. Teresa
knew that the opportunity had been made, and knew that she ought to be
grateful, but she was anxious and miserable, and more than a little
wounded by her lover's unwillingness to accept her mother's invitation.

"I should have _liked_ to nurse you, Dane!" she said reproachfully, and
Dane pressed his lips in a spasm of pain, and rejoined quietly:

"I know, dear. Thank you, but it's better as it is. I'll be
confoundedly glad to get this shoe off, and try what sponging will do.
You'll come up?"

"Oh, yes!" Teresa said. She leant against the side of the Bath chair,
and held out a tentative hand. "I wish it had been me! I'd rather bear
it myself a dozen times. It _will_ help you, won't it, Dane, if I come
and sit beside you? If I were ill, I'd want more than anything else
just to see your face!"

"Bless you, Teresa! You're a dear girl," Dane said, smiling, but his
eyes wandered wistfully to the doorway. The Squire was right. A man in
pain has no zest for love-making. A woman would welcome it with her
dying breath.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

REALISATION.

By nine o'clock in the evening the Swedish masseur had arrived, and
begun his manipulations. He promised that his patient should walk by
the end of five or six days, and at the Squire's request agreed to put
up at the Court for that period, giving several treatments a day. His
fee made Peignton grimace, but he had to admit that it was cheap in
comparison with weeks of inactivity. A telephone message brought a
couple of bags filled with his clothes and toilette accessories, and he
settled down to rest with the satisfaction of a man relieved from pain,
and agreeably expectant of the future. Raynor was a good fellow; no one
could have been kinder, and it certainly was a comfor