Diana looked at her gently, vaguely alarmed, though at what she could not divine. Her first thought, strangely enough, was a message from Jacob, and her manner grew cold. “Yes,” she said quietly, “I am Diana Royall; can I do anything for you?” The stranger hesitated; then her natural manner, which was full of self-command, asserted itself. “I am Mrs. Fenwick. I know you do not know me, but”--she glanced down the long garden path--“will you walk with me a moment?” she said. “I have something to say to you.” Diana assented reluctantly. Her own heart was behind the half-closed shutters in that upper room, and at another time she would have thought the request at once remarkable and unwarranted. They turned and walked together down the garden path, and as Diana stooped to unlatch the wicket gate which shut off the rose garden from the larger grounds, her companion shaded her eyes with her hand and looked off toward the river. “There have been some changes in this view, I think,” she said abruptly, her eyes on the landscape; “the river was more obscured by trees.” “The railroad cut cleared a bit of forest and gave us a finer view,” replied Diana, and then she glanced quickly at her visitor, who was evidently familiar with the prospect. “I thought so,” said Mrs. Fenwick softly, “this view is familiar; it is the same that one sees from your mother’s old room.” Diana stood still, with her hand on the wicket. “Did you know my mother?” she asked quickly. The older woman turned and looked fully at her. She had been very beautiful in her first youth, and Diana was conscious of a charm at once subtle and persuasive. “Is your mother dead?” she asked gently. The girl was deeply perplexed. “She died twenty years ago,” she replied. “She died twenty years ago?” her visitor repeated dreamily, looking away again. “It may be so! She may have died to this life here, to this place, to these people, but believe me, Diana, she is not dead.” They had passed through the wicket and were standing on the lower lawn. Instinctively Diana drew further away from her; she did not understand her, and she disliked her familiarity, but as yet she was unalarmed. “My mother died in that room up there,” she said, with gentle dignity, “and my father has mourned her ever since, and has taught me to mourn her, too.” A deep flush passed over Mrs. Fenwick’s face, and her hands trembled a little as they hung clasped before her. Diana, watching her, noticed it and noticed the grace of her pose. The girl thought that the elder woman never forgot herself, that her actions, even her gestures, were considered, that there was something artificial in them, yet her emotion was evident and unfeigned. “It was good of him,” said Mrs. Fenwick slowly, “it was, I suppose, a beautiful idea, but it was an untruthful one. Diana, I am your mother.”