Very slowly peace was returning to her heart. A long talk with Sir Gilbert had completed what Thorold had commenced. Gentian could look up now and take courage. A sharp attack of gout, which laid Mr. Wharnecliffe up, prevented his wife from going to Cornwall as soon as she had intended. Gentian was disappointed, but she had learnt to control her feelings. The Miss Buchans were kind, and treated her quite as one of the family, but their surprised faces when Gentian at first burst into one of her tirades, showed her that she must put a curb upon her tongue. It was discipline to which she was not accustomed. She relieved her feelings by writing long letters to Thorold. "I don't care whether you answer me or not, and I give you leave to tear my letters up directly you have read them, but I have no Waddy now, and I simply must pour out my heart to some one. You would not know me. So meek, so quiet, so gentle of tongue am I, so serene and unaware of all vexations and annoyances! That is the outside me. But the inside! Ah! It is a boiling cauldron, and a mass of contradictions, whims and whamsies. "I am learning to ride; it is kind of Miss Horatia to let me. I work off a good many tempers and moods when I am jogging along the roads with Green, the groom. But when we get to a bit of grass we have a good canter, and away fly all my black shadows and rebellious feelings! I come back to the house ready for anything!" And then one morning Mrs. Wharnecliffe arrived at the Mount asking the Miss Buchans if they would allow Gentian to come with her the next day to Cornwall. "We shall only be away the week-end. I am going to put up at the small inn at Perrancombe. And I shall go down in the car; the trains are so tedious." Miss Anne said she would be willing to spare Gentian, and so it was settled and the girl went about the house with such a radiant face that Miss Horatia chaffed her about it. "I thought you and Thorold Holt were always sparring with one another. You have told me that you did not like his interference. Is it a case of 'absence makes the heart grow fonder'?" "It isn't altogether him," said Gentian confusedly; "it's the sea, and the mines, and the Cornish people I want to see. Besides, it's a trip to an unknown place, and I always love that!" Then she added with her natural truthfulness: "I feel differently about Cousin Thor now; he's a link with the past—the only link I have; every one has been swept away from me. He's always a kind of buffer to me, and I miss him. And he has been very kind to me, hasn't he? I came to England a stranger. Now dear Waddy has gone, I feel stranger than ever. There isn't a person in the whole wide world who really belongs to me. How would you feel if you were I?" "You'll be able to remedy that one day," said Miss Horatia. Miss Anne looked horrified at the insinuation, and Gentian laughed her merry laugh. "I'm not in a hurry to belong to a stranger," she said.