It was no use to pretend that she had not been crying. She rubbed her eyes with her handkerchief, turning her back for a moment on her mother and gazing down on to the dark lawn that had all melted now into the rain. Then, when she had gained her control, she faced the room again. “It’s nothing, mother. I’ve had a headache. It’s better. I’ll lie down a little and then come in. Is Agnes Drake here?” “Yes. She wants to see you.” “Well. I’ll come.” But Mrs. Trenchard did not go away. Her large soft eyes never left her daughter’s face. “What’s really the matter, dear?” “Really—a headache. This weather and then Sunday School. I felt bad in church this morning.” “You’ve been unlike yourself, dear, for some days.” “No, mother—I’ve been just the same.” “You’ve been unhappy.” Katherine raised her head proudly and gave back her mother’s gaze. “There’s been nothing—nothing at all—” But Mrs. Trenchard’s eyes never faltered. She suddenly, with an action that was full of maternal love, but love restrained by fear of its rejection, love that had tenderness in its request to be accepted, raised her hands as though she would take her daughter, and hold her safe and never let her depart into danger again. “Katie—” her voice was soft, and she let her hands fall again. “Give it up, dear. Break the engagement. Let him go.” Katherine did not answer, but she raised her head higher than it had been before, and then, suddenly, as though the irony of her whole relationship with her mother, with Philip, with the very world itself, had driven in upon her, she smiled. Mrs. Trenchard went on: “You aren’t happy, Katie, darling. We all notice it. It was so sudden, the engagement. You couldn’t tell at the time. But now—I’ve never said anything, have I? You’ve seen that I’ve been perfectly fair, but you know that I’ve never liked him—I said give it its chance. But now that he’s been down here, you can judge how different we all are—it’s plain that it won’t do. Of course you couldn’t tell at the time. But now—” “Ah,” Katherine said quietly, “that’s why you asked him here. I wondered.” At the sudden hostility in Katherine’s voice Mrs. Trenchard started. Then, quite timidly, as though she were asking some great favour, she said: “You mustn’t be angry with me for that. I only care about your happiness. I’m older—If I think that you are not going to be happy I’m worried and distressed of course. What can he be to me compared with you? And lately you yourself have been different—different to all of us ... Yes ... You know that if I thought that he would make you happy....” Her voice was quickly sharp sounding on a trembling, quivering note. “Katie—give him up. Give him up. There’ll be somebody much better. There are all of us. Give him up, darling. Tell him that you don’t love him as you thought you did.”