"Look here, Nora." He took her hand again, and his tone became half cajoling, half threatening. "I can guess what she has come about. She wants to get you back and put you against me—against us all. She will tell you all sorts of lies. But you won’t believe her, and you’ll stick to us this time? Swear, Nora!" She tried to shake herself free. "Why should I swear? You know I shan’t go back—I couldn’t; and she would be the last person to want it. She has come about something else; perhaps about the——" She stopped with a quick breath of pain. "Let me go, Miles! "All right. But you’ll stand by me, Nora? And you won’t believe her lies?" "I don’t know what you mean. What are you afraid of?" "Nothing; only I know they’ll do anything to—to put us in the wrong. They hate us like the devil. I—I wanted to warn you, that’s all." Nora did not understand him. His manner, over-excited as it was, frightened her even more than this strangest of all strange visits. What miracle had brought the feeble invalid over the sea to seek her—what miracle or what catastrophe? And as she entered the drawing-room and saw the beautiful, exhausted face and stern, unsmiling eyes which had once been all love and tenderness for her, the fear grew to something definite, so that she stopped short, hesitating, overwhelmed by that and by a sudden shame. But of shame Hildegarde Arnim saw no sign. She saw defiance in that waiting attitude, and not even the pathos of the black dress and pale, sad face could touch her. She rose, but gave no sign of greeting. "My mother sent me to you," she said. "I am to tell you that your—that Wolff is dying." She seemed to take a cruel delight in the change which came over the other’s face. "Dying," she repeated deliberately. "Dying." Nora clasped her hands in an agonised movement of appeal. "I know—I have heard you. For pity’s sake, tell me——"