tly say: "I'll go to the Registrar now."

"Now?" Magnificent was the sound Mrs. Gereth threw into this
monosyllable. "And pray who's to take you?" Fleda gave a colorless
smile, and her companion continued: "Do you literally mean that you
can't put your hand upon him?" Fleda's wan grimace appeared to irritate
her; she made a short, imperious gesture. "Find him for me, you
fool--_find_ him for me!"

"What do you want of him," Fleda sadly asked, "feeling as you do to both
of us?"

"Never mind how I feel, and never mind what I say when I'm furious!"
Mrs. Gereth still more incisively added. "Of course I cling to you, you
wretches, or I shouldn't suffer as I do. What I want of him is to see
that he takes you; what I want of him is to go with you myself to the
place." She looked round the room as if, in feverish haste, for a mantle
to catch up; she bustled to the window as if to spy out a cab: she would
allow half an hour for the job. Already in her bonnet, she had snatched
from the sofa a garment for the street: she jerked it on as she came
back. "Find him, find him," she repeated; "come straight out with me, to
try, at least, to get at him!"

"How can I get at him? He'll come when he's ready," Fleda replied.

Mrs. Gereth turned on her sharply. "Ready for what? Ready to see me
ruined without a reason or a reward?"

Fleda was silent; the worst of it all was that there was something
unspoken between them. Neither of them dared to utter it, but the
influence of it was in the girl's tone when she returned at last, with
great gentleness: "Don't be harsh to me--I'm very unhappy." The words
produced a visible impression on Mrs. Gereth, who held her face averted
and sent off through the window a gaze that kept pace with the long
caravan of her treasures. Fleda knew she was watching it wind up the
avenue of Poynton--Fleda participated indeed fully in the vision; so
that after a little the most consoling thing seemed to her to add: "I
don't see why in the world you take so for granted that he's, as you
say, 'lost.'"

Mrs. Gereth continued to stare out of the window, and her stillness
denoted some success in controlling herself. "If he's not lost, why are
you unhappy?"

"I'm unhappy because I torment you, and you don't understand me."

"No, Fleda, I don't understand you," said Mrs. Gereth, finally facing
her again. "I don't understand you at all, and it's as if you and Owen
were of quite another race and another flesh. You ma