"I could not think. I could not see. It was all frightening--and unreal." She had not dreamed of asking questions. Donal had taken care of her and tried to help her to be less afraid of seeing people who might recognise her. She had tilted her hat over her face and worn a veil. She had gone home to Eaton Square--and then in the afternoon to the cottage at Mersham Wood. They had not written letters to each other. Robin had been afraid and they had met almost every day. Once Lord Coombe thought himself on the track of some clue when she touched vaguely on some paper Donal had meant to send her and had perhaps forgotten in the haste and pressure of the last few hours because his orders had been so sudden. But there was no trace. There had been something he wished her to have. But if this had meant that his brain had by chance cleared to sane reasoning and he had, for a few moments touched earth and intended to send her some proof which would be protection if she needed it--the moment had been too late and, at the last, action had proved impossible. And Death had come so soon. It was as though a tornado had swept him out of her arms and dashed him broken to earth. And she was left with nothing because she asked nothing--wanted nothing. The obviousness of this, when he had ended his questioning and exhausted his resources, was a staggering thing. "Do you know," he said grimly, after it was all over, "--that no one will believe you?" "Donal knew," she said. "There is no one--no one else." "You mean that there is no one whose belief or disbelief would affect you?" The Wood was growing darker still and she had ceased crying and sat still like a small ghost in the dim light. "There never _was_ any one but Donal, you know," she said. To all the rest of the world she was as a creature utterly unawake and to a man who was of the world and who had lived a long life in it the contemplation of her was a strange and baffling thing. "You do not ask whether _I_ believe you?" he spoke quite low. The silence of the darkening wood was unearthly and her dropped word scarcely stirred it. "No." She had never even thought of it. He himself was inwardly shaken by his own feeling. "I will believe you if--you will believe me," was what he said, a singular sharp new desire impelling him. She merely lifted her face a little so that her eyes rested upon him.