moment he had held
from her. Now he shut everything within himself.

"I wish you had not done it. It was a mistake," was all he said.
Suddenly he felt thrown back upon himself, heartsick and cold. For the
first time in his life he could not see her side of the question. The
impassioned egotism of first love overwhelmed him.

"You met her on the night of the old Duchess' dance," Helen said.

"Yes."

"You have met her since?"

"Yes."

"It is useless for older people to interfere," she said. "We have loved
each other very much. We have been happy together. But I can do nothing
to help you. Oh! Donal, my own dear!"

Her involuntary movement of putting her hand to her throat was a piteous
gesture.

"You are going away," she pleaded. "Don't let anything come between
us--not _now_! It is not as if you were going to stay. When you come
back perhaps--"

"I may never come back," he answered and as he said it he saw again the
widowed girl who had hurried past him crying because he had saluted her.
And he saw Robin as he had seen her the night before--Robin who belonged
to no one--whom no one missed at any time when she went in or out--who
could come and go and meet a man anywhere as if she were the only little
soul in London. And yet who had always that pretty, untouched air.

"I only wanted to be sure. It was a mistake. We will never speak of it
again," he added.

"If it was a mistake, forgive it. It was only because I could not hear
that your life should not be beautiful. These are not like other days.
Oh! Donal my dear, my dear!" And she broke into weeping and took him in
her arms and he held her and kissed her tenderly. But whatsoever
happened--whatsoever he did he knew that if he was to save and hold his
bliss to the end he could not tell her now.

CHAPTER X

Mrs. Bennett's cottage on the edge of Mersham Wood seemed to Robin when
she first saw it to be only a part of a fairy tale. It is true that only
in certain bits of England and in pictures in books of fairy tales did
one see cottages of its kind, and in them always lived with their
grandmothers--in the fairy stories as Robin remembered--girls who would
in good time be discovered by wandering youngest sons of fairy story
kings. The wood of great oaks and beeches spread behind and at each side
of it and seemed to have no end in any land on earth. It nestled against
its primaeval looking background in a nook of its own. Under the broad
branches o