"Am I going off again?" she muttered. She had presence of mind to take the letter, which had fallen from her shaking hand, and to thrust it into her pocket. The second letter she put mechanically into its envelope, then it dropped from her grasp, and she staggered to the armchair, lying back with shut eyes. A slight tap made her reply, "Come in." And Phyllys appeared in a new frock of pale blue, a present from Mrs. Keith. There was a touch of constraint in her manner, though she tried to be as usual. She would not accept, but could not forget, that strange midnight suggestion. "I want you to see how nice my dress looks," she said. "But you are ill." "A touch of faintness. Not much. Some eau-de-cologne, please." Phyllys went to the dressing-table, beside which lay on the floor an envelope. She picked it up and laid it on the table, with the addressed side uppermost: "Colin Keith, Esquire." Evidently meant to go by the evening post. Then she poured the liquid on Mrs. Keith's palm, and dabbed it behind her ears. "You must keep quiet," she said. "It is early still. Nobody will come for twenty minutes." But contradicting herself—"Why, there is a carriage already." She went to the window. "Not a carriage, but a railway fly." Mrs. Keith sat upright, and faintness vanished. If this were the worst, she would brace herself to meet it. "Colin has come!" exclaimed Phyllys. "Nonsense! He is in Scotland." "I saw him plainly, in the light from the door." Mrs. Keith leant back, shaking like a leaf. The momentary terror, courageously met, had been awful; and reaction was severe. She had felt certain that the deferred possibility of years, nay, of decades of years, was a present reality. Another tap at the door was accompanied by a slow—"Mother here?" Phyllys' "Yes" was prompt, and he entered before Mrs. Keith could speak. "You did not expect me," he said. "Just in time for dinner." He kissed Mrs. Keith on a cheek coldly presented, and Phyllys wondered if he felt the lack of welcome. He said a kind word about her apparent exhaustion, though, as Phyllys could not help noting, it aroused no anxiety. Then, when she would have moved, he murmured, "Pray don't go. I'm off." As he passed the dressing-table, he saw the envelope addressed to himself, and took it. "Save the postman that trouble! From Giles," he remarked, and drew the sheet out, as it happened with the fourth page towards himself. "No!" in surprise. "I could have declared it to be his writing. Oddly like!" He turned to the first page, and a singular expression came. "What are you doing there?" Mrs. Keith asked irritably. "This is yours; not mine," and he came nearer. "You must have put it by mistake into the wrong envelope." "What?" The word cracked out like a pistol-shot. She jumped up. "What are you talking about?" He placed the letter in her hands. "I saw the address, and took it—but it is for yourself. I suppose you have another for me."