Janet's face, which had been so wan, was flushed a deep red. She stirred uneasily, and began speaking hoarsely and incoherently. "All burnt," she said, over and over again. "All burnt. Nothing left." Anne laid down the fan she held in her hand, and drew a step nearer. Janet suddenly sat up, opened her eyes to a horrible width, and stared at her. "I have burnt them all, Fred," she said, looking full at Anne. "Everything. There is nothing left. I promised I would, and I have. But oh! Fred, how could you do it? How could you, could you, do it?" And she burst into a low cry of anguish. Anne took her by the arm. "You are dreaming, Janet," she said. "Wake up. Look! You are here with me, Anne--your friend." Janet winced, and her eyelids quivered. Then she looked round her bewildered, and said in a more natural voice: "I don't know where I am. I thought I was at home with Fred." "I have sent for your brother, and he will come and take you home to-morrow." "Something dreadful has happened," said Janet. "It is like a stone on my head. It crushes me, but I don't know what it is." Anne looked gravely at Janet, and half unconsciously unclasped the thin chain, with its heavy diamond pendant, from her neck. Her hand trembled as she did it. She was not thinking of Janet at that moment. "I shall not see him to-night," she was saying to herself. And the delicate colour faded, the hidden tumult died down. She was calm and practical once more. She wrote a note, sent it down to the waiting carriage to deliver, got quickly out of the flowing white gown into a dressing-gown, and returned to Janet. * * * * * Fred came to London the following day. Even his mercurial nature was distressed at Cuckoo's sudden death, and at Janet's wan, fixed face. But he felt that if his sister must be ill, she could not be better placed than in that ducal household. A good many persons among Fred's acquaintances heard of Janet's illness during the next few days, and of the kindness of the Duke and Duchess of Quorn. The Duke and Duchess really were kind. The benevolence of so down-trodden and helpless a creature as the Duke--who was of no importance except in affairs of the realm, where he was a power--his kindness, of course, was of no account. But the Duchess rose to the occasion. She was one of those small, square, kind-hearted, determined women, with a long upper lip, whose faces are set on looking upwards, who can make life vulgarly happy for struggling, middle-class men, if they are poor enough to give their wives scope for an unceasing energy on their behalf. She was a _femme incomprise_, misplaced. By birth she was the equal of her gentle-mannered husband, but she was one of Nature's vulgarians all the same, and directly the thin gilt of a certain youthful prettiness wore off--she had been a plump, bustling little partridge at twenty--her innate commonness came obviously to the surface; in fact, it became the surface.