a walk with him."

Anna glanced at the clock. "I'll go down presently." She waited and
looked again at Sophy Viner, whose troubled eyes seemed to commit their
message to her. "You'd better tell Owen, my dear."

Owen's look also turned on the girl. "Tell me what? Why, what's
happened?"

Anna summoned a laugh to ease the vague tension of the moment. "Don't
look so startled! Nothing, except that Sophy proposes to desert us for a
while for the Farlows."

Owen's brow cleared. "I was afraid she'd run off before long." He
glanced at Anna. "Do please keep her here as long as you can!"

Sophy intervened: "Mrs. Leath's already given me leave to go."

"Already? To go when?"

"Today," said Sophy in a low tone, her eyes on Anna's.

"Today? Why on earth should you go today?" Owen dropped back a step or
two, flushing and paling under his bewildered frown. His eyes seemed to
search the girl more closely. "Something's happened." He too looked at
his step-mother. "I suppose she must have told you what it is?"

Anna was struck by the suddenness and vehemence of his appeal. It was as
though some smouldering apprehension had lain close under the surface of
his security.

"She's told me nothing except that she wishes to be with her friends.
It's quite natural that she should want to go to them."

Owen visibly controlled himself. "Of course--quite natural." He spoke
to Sophy. "But why didn't you tell me so? Why did you come first to my
step-mother?"

Anna intervened with her calm smile. "That seems to me quite natural,
too. Sophy was considerate enough to tell me first because of Effie."

He weighed it. "Very well, then: that's quite natural, as you say. And
of course she must do exactly as she pleases." He still kept his eyes on
the girl. "Tomorrow," he abruptly announced, "I shall go up to Paris to
see you."

"Oh, no--no!" she protested.

Owen turned back to Anna. "NOW do you say that nothing's happened?"

Under the influence of his agitation Anna felt a vague tightening of
the heart. She seemed to herself like some one in a dark room about whom
unseen presences are groping.

"If it's anything that Sophy wishes to tell you, no doubt she'll do
so. I'm going down now, and I'll leave you here to talk it over by
yourselves."

As she moved to the door the girl caught up with her. "But there's
nothing to tell: why should there be? I've explained that I simply want
to be quiet." Her look seemed to detain Mrs. Leath.

Owen