"No, no!" she said. "For pity's sake. You are calling her back." Then, struck with a new idea, she grew, if possible, whiter still. "Unless," she said, whispering, "you saw her--you too? Then there is no hope. I thought it was in my mind--only in my mind--but if you saw her too----" Her voice failed. He thrust in hastily, ready enough to comfort her, but knowing well that the time had not come. Yet he felt like a surgeon at his first operation. "No, you are mistaken. There was no one. I don't even know who Louise is. Only you mentioned her--once or twice, you see." "Did I?" she said. Then, with an effort at a commonplace tone: "I was stupidly upset. You must excuse----" He broke in. "Who is Louise?" he asked her bluntly. "A ghost," said Alwynne, white to the lips. Again they were blankly silent. Then she spoke, with extraordinary passion-- "If you laugh--it will be wicked if you laugh at me." "I'm not thinking of laughing," he said, with the petulance of extreme anxiety. She met his look and shrugged her shoulders. "Then you think I'm crazy," she began defiantly. "I can't help it, what you think." She changed the subject transparently. "Roger, it's nice here. What are the names of all these flowers? Are those big ones daffodils, or jonquils, or narcissi? I never know the difference. I never remember----" Her voice trailed into silence. "But look here," he began, and stopped again abruptly, deep in thought. The flame of the spirit-lamp on the shelf between them flickered and failed, and sputtered up again noisily. Mechanically he rose to extinguish it, and, still absently, cleared the little table of its china and eatables. Then he sat down once more, and leant forward, his arms on the table, his expression determined, yet very friendly. "Alwynne," he said, in his most matter-of-fact voice, "hadn't you better tell me all about it?" "You?" "Why not?" he said comfortably. "You'll feel ever so much better if you get if off your chest." For an instant she hesitated: then she shook her head wearily. "I would like to tell some one. But I can't. I sound mad, even to myself. I couldn't tell any one. I couldn't tell Elsbeth even." "Of course not," he agreed. "You can't worry your own people." "No, you can't, can you?" she said, grateful for his comprehension. "Of course not. But you see--I'm different. Whatever your trouble is, it won't worry me--because I don't care for you like Elsbeth and your friends. So you can just ease off on me--d'you see? If I do think you mad, it just doesn't matter, does it? What does it matter telling some one a secret when you'll never see them again? Don't you see?" he argued reassuringly. She nodded dumbly. The cheerful, impersonal kindness of his voice and air made her want to cry. She realised how she had been aching for sympathy. "Don't you see?" he repeated. "You wouldn't make fun?" she asked him. "You wouldn't tell any one? You wouldn't talk me over?" "No, Alwynne," he said gravely.