Mrs. Brougham was sitting in the bow-window; she always sat there nowadays, and there was reality enough in her pale, weary face. Almost the first smile that had lightened it since Maud had disappeared, came to it when she saw Reggie. "Oh, Reggie!" she exclaimed. Reggie came to the open window and leaned on the sill. "Well, mother," he said, lifting up his face to kiss her. He had always called her mother and kissed her, since the days when he had worn knickers and been Gertrude's chum. "Well, mother, aren't you surprised to see me?" "Very," she said, "is it your holidays?" Reggie nodded. "I only heard yesterday about Maud," he said gently. "There's nothing fresh--no news, I suppose?" "Nothing," said Mrs. Brougham, hopelessly. She felt somehow comforted by Reggie's coming. He was so like one of themselves, so old a friend that there was nothing to explain, no need for excusing words, no fear that his sympathy would make the sorrow wake again. Reggie felt it too. He stood there quite silent for a minute, still holding her hand; then he said, "If you knew where Gertrude would be this afternoon, I could go and meet her. She'll be so surprised to see me." "Yes," answered Mrs. Brougham mechanically. She knew far, far more of those stories about Gertrude, than Gertrude ever guessed. Even in those early summer days of the picnics and tennis parties that had filled all Gertrude's mind, Conway and Willie had confided to their mother that they wished Gertrude would not be quite so _pleasant_. She sighed a little as she looked into Reggie's bright, open face. Girls did not always know true gold when they saw it. Then she remembered that Reggie had asked her a question. "Oh, yes," she said hastily, "I was forgetting. Come in, Reggie; she is at home this afternoon. Denys had to go to Mixham, and I persuaded her to take Pattie with her--I am so nervous now," she added pathetically, "and Gertrude has been busy in the kitchen all the afternoon, but she's done now, and I believe she went to the drawing-room to study." "I'll go round the garden way and disturb her," said Reggie, with a laugh. He thought as he went round the garden that "Gertrude busy in the kitchen all the afternoon," had an odd sound. Gertrude had not begun to study. She sat in a deep armchair, her books unopened on her lap, looking out upon the sunny garden, and brooding drearily over the past, wondering sadly whether, if Maud were never, never found, she could ever feel happy again! And if happiness did come to her, and Maud had not come back, how terrible that would be, for it would mean that she had forgotten Maud, forgotten her wrong-doing; that she had become again the self-loving, self-centred being that had lost Maud! As Reggie's figure crossed the grass she sprang up, and her books fell with a clatter to the ground. "Oh, Reggie!" she said, just as her mother had done. "Yes," said Reggie, "I've come! I only heard yesterday."