He looked at her sweet face with the affection in the eyes. She was wearing a white dress and the blossoms were a roseate glow against it. He struggled against all that he blindly felt she represented: all he had lost, all that would have kept the present and the future from being blank. His face suffused with color, his eyes with tears. "I can't bear it!" he said suddenly, with more force than she had supposed was in him, and rising with an energy of movement that sent his chair over with a crash, he fled into the house. Mrs. Lowell bent her head over the flowers for minutes, and, when she raised it, there was dew upon them. She looked off a moment in thought, then rose, went into the house and upstairs to the Gayne room. The door was ajar. She could hear the boy sobbing. Entering, she saw him stretched on his cot, and she approached, drawing a chair beside it. Seating herself, she put a hand on his tightly doubled arm and looked at the averted, dark head, its face buried in the pillow. She spoke to him quietly: "Bertie, I am going to do just as you plan and not ask you to go about with me any more, but I want you to remember all the time that I love you and am thinking of you, and knowing that better times are coming for you. No human being can have as much power over us as God has. He isn't going to forget His own children whom He has created. So the more you think about Him, knowing that He is all-powerful and all-loving, the sooner you will feel His help coming to you. We don't know just how or when, but be sure it will come if you won't listen to discouragement. Discouragement is like a cloud that hides the sun, and God is the sun of the whole universe. You are trying to hide away from Him when you weep and let thoughts of grief and despair come in." Her voice carried through the nervous, dry sobs, and they lessened as she talked. When she finished, the dark head lay still on the pillow. She patted the thin arm. "Now I will leave you, Bertie," she went on. "Try to think about the Shepherd. 'The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.' Say that over and over to yourself, and know that it is true. Some day all these things that seem barriers to everything that you feel makes life worth living, will melt away. Think about it, and be hopeful, dear child. Remember I am in the house when you want me, and remember that I love to help you. Good-bye, dear." She stooped over the averted face and kissed the boy's temple. Then she passed out and down the stairs. The answer to Diana's telegram came from her mother, and read as follows: Your father away on the yacht. Be cautious socially. No Loring relatives or friends in this country. Letter follows. The letter did follow with great promptness. It was the old story of the worried hen who had hatched a duck. _My dear child_: