But Mrs. Wilkins, after tugging agitatedly at a handkerchief that wouldn’t come out of her pocket, did succeed at last in merely apparently blowing her nose with it, and then, blinking her eyes very quickly once or twice, looked at Mrs. Arbuthnot with a quivering air of half humble, half frightened apology, and smiled. “Will you believe,” she whispered, trying to steady her mouth, evidently dreadfully ashamed of herself, “that I’ve never spoken to any one before in my life like this? I can’t think, I simply don’t know, what has come over me.” “It’s the advertisement,” said Mrs. Arbuthnot, nodding gravely. “Yes,” said Mrs. Wilkins, dabbing furtively at her eyes, “and us both being so—”—she blew her nose again a little—“miserable.” Chapter 2 Of course Mrs. Arbuthnot was not miserable—how could she be, she asked herself, when God was taking care of her?—but she let that pass for the moment unrepudiated, because of her conviction that here was another fellow-creature in urgent need of her help; and not just boots and blankets and better sanitary arrangements this time, but the more delicate help of comprehension, of finding the exact right words. The exact right words, she presently discovered, after trying various ones about living for others, and prayer, and the peace to be found in placing oneself unreservedly in God’s hands—to meet all these words Mrs. Wilkins had other words, incoherent and yet, for the moment at least, till one had had more time, difficult to answer—the exact right words were a suggestion that it would do no harm to answer the advertisement. Non-committal. Mere inquiry. And what disturbed Mrs. Arbuthnot about this suggestion was that she did not make it solely to comfort Mrs. Wilkins; she made it because of her own strange longing for the mediaeval castle. This was very disturbing. There she was, accustomed to direct, to lead, to advise, to support—except Frederick; she long since had learned to leave Frederick to God—being led herself, being influenced and thrown off her feet, by just an advertisement, by just an incoherent stranger. It was indeed disturbing. She failed to understand her sudden longing for what was, after all, self-indulgence, when for years no such desire had entered her heart. “There’s no harm in simply _asking_,” she said in a low voice, as if the vicar and the Savings Bank and all her waiting and dependent poor were listening and condemning. “It isn’t as if it _committed_ us to anything,” said Mrs. Wilkins, also in a low voice, but her voice shook.