With the tenderest of smiles in her eyes, which were blue as the sky, she advanced towards us and kissed him; and I, who detest things sentimental as I would the plague, thought it was the loveliest tribute I had ever seen. Before he could speak, she turned and gave me both her hands. "I won't apologize," she said, and her voice was as sweet as a brook's, "because I know you both enjoyed your talk of old times the better for my absence." "It was a wonderful afternoon," I said, "but it would have been doubly so with you here." And then I, the Pest, the cynic, the modernist, stooped and kissed her hand. It seemed the natural thing to do, and she accepted it with the understanding heart that Nature had given her. "But, Lilias, where is the lad?" "Oh," she laughed gaily, "the station-master kept him a moment to show him an entirely new button he had thought of. But here he is now." Coming up the path, carrying a couple of parcels, was a boy of, perhaps, ten years of age. His hair was golden and curly, and his eyes had a dreamy look that contrasted strangely with the strength of his chin. He had the poise and the appearance of a thoughtful, well-bred youth; but there was something, I could not say what, that told me he was not English. He touched his cap to me as he came on the lawn and smiled cordially to Basil. "Do you remember the gentleman?" asked Norman. The boy shook his head and unconsciously moved nearer to the woman, who placed her hand on his shoulder. "You shouldn't forget each other," laughed Norman, "for once he played the drums under your baton." A few minutes later we went in for tea, the boy and Mrs. Norman going first. I waited while Sindbad prepared to move the invalid, and then turned to him for an explanation. "Klotz was killed," said Norman swiftly, "and his wife died a month later, after she heard of his death. We have adopted Siegfried as our ward." XIII That night a storm came up from the sea, and the house rattled and shook in the clutch of a November gale. The trees that looked like palms swayed and bent before the wind, and the many-colored leaves in the garden fled like refugees before an attack, and covered the ground with their quivering bodies. We were gathered in the music-room, the cosy warmth from a fire of logs making pleasant contrast to the snarling wind outside. The evening had been a memorable one. The woman whose beauty was so delicate had charmed us with her voice, her playing; charmed us without effort or knowing how.