'You are not listening to me, Polly. You are tired, my dear,' Richard said at last, in his kind fraternal way. 'No, I am very rude. But I cannot help thinking of Rex; how ill he is, and how terribly wasted he looks!' 'I knew it would be a shock to you. I am thankful that my father's gout prevents him from travelling; he would fret dreadfully over Roy's altered appearance. But we must be thankful that he is as well as he is. I could not help thinking all that night--the night before you and Aunt Milly came--what I should do if we lost him.' 'Don't, Richard. I cannot bear to think of it.' 'It ought to make us so grateful,' he murmured. 'First Olive and then Roy brought back from the very brink of the grave. It is too much goodness; it makes one ashamed of one's discontent.' And he sighed involuntarily. 'But it is so sad to see him so helpless. You said he was as light as a child when you lifted him, Richard, and if he speaks a word or two he coughs. I am afraid Dr. Blenkinsop is right in saying he must go to Hastings for the winter.' 'We shall hear what Dr. John says when he comes up next. You expect him soon, Polly?' But Richard, as he asked the question, avoided meeting her eyes. He feared lest this long absence had excited suspicions which he might find difficult to answer. But Polly's innocence was proof against any such surmises. 'I cannot think what keeps him,' she returned, disconsolately. Olive says he is not very busy, and that his new assistant relieves him of half his work.' 'And he gives you no reason?' touching the log to elicit another shower of sparks. 'No, he only says that he cannot come at present, and answers all my reproaches with jests--you know his way. I don't think he half knows how I want him. Richard, I do wish you would do something for me. Write to him to-morrow, and ask him to come; tell him I want him very badly, that I never wanted him half so much before.' 'Dear Polly, you cannot need him so much as that,' trying to turn off her earnestness with a laugh. 'You do not know--you none of you know--how much I want him,' with a strange vehemence in her tone. 'When he is near me I feel safe--almost happy. Ah!' cried the girl, with a sad wistfulness coming into her eyes, 'when I see him I do not need to remind myself of his goodness and love--I can feel it then. Oh, Richard dear! tell him he must come--that I am afraid to be without him any longer.' Afraid of what? Did she know? Did Richard know? 'She seems very restless without you,' he wrote that Sunday afternoon. 'I fancy Roy's manner frets her. He is fitful in his moods--a little irritable even to her, and yet unable to bear her out of his sight. He would be brought down into the studio again to-day, though Aunt Milly begged him to spare himself. Polly has been trying all the afternoon to amuse him, but he will not be amused. She has just gone off to the piano, in the hope of singing him to sleep. Rex tyrannises over us all dreadfully.'