st
expression of the kind I had ever seen in her face. Mrs. Pallant's
attention, on the other hand, rather strayed from me; after we had been
left there together she sat silent, not heeding me, looking at the lake
and mountains--at the snowy crests crowned with the flush of evening.
She seemed not even to follow our young companions as they got into
their boat and pushed off. For some minutes I respected her mood; I
walked slowly up and down the terrace and lighted a cigar, as she had
always permitted me to do at Homburg. I found in her, it was true,
rather a new air of weariness; her fine cold well-bred face was pale;
I noted in it new lines of fatigue, almost of age. At last I stopped in
front of her and--since she looked so sad--asked if she had been having
bad news.

"The only bad news was when I learned--through your nephew's note to
Linda--that you were coming to us."

"Ah then he wrote?"

"Certainly he wrote."

"You take it all harder than I do," I returned as I sat down beside her.
And then I added, smiling: "Have you written to his mother?"

Slowly at last, and more directly, she faced me. "Take care, take care,
or you'll have been more brutal than you'll afterwards like," she said
with an air of patience before the inevitable.

"Never, never! Unless you think me brutal if I ask whether you knew when
Linda wrote."

She had an hesitation. "Yes, she showed me her letter. She wouldn't have
done anything else. I let it go because I didn't know what course was
best. I'm afraid to oppose her to her face."

"Afraid, my dear friend, with that girl?"

"That girl? Much you know about her! It didn't follow you'd come. I
didn't take that for granted."

"I'm like you," I said--"I too am afraid of my nephew. I don't venture
to oppose him to his face. The only thing I could do--once he wished
it--was to come with him."

"I see. Well, there are grounds, after all, on which I'm glad," she
rather inscrutably added.

"Oh I was conscientious about that! But I've no authority; I can neither
drive him nor stay him--I can use no force," I explained. "Look at the
way he's pulling that boat and see if you can fancy me."

"You could tell him she's a bad hard girl--one who'd poison any good
man's life!" my companion broke out with a passion that startled me.

At first I could only gape. "Dear lady, what do you mean?"

She bent her face into her hands, covering it over with them, and so
remained a minute; then she cont