"I made my will yesterday, Pam." Pamela looked up in surprise. "I have provided for Minx. I have left her this place, and a good deal of money. She will look after my poor for me." Pamela nodded her head. "I've left you nothing, Pam. But I've given Mary what will start her in housekeeping. _You_ are going to marry a rich man." "You are good to think of Mary." "It is easier to do now than if I had lived longer. Between my legacy and what Glengall will do she need not want." "She deserves to be happy." "But what is the matter with you, Pam? Why aren't _you_ happy?" "I am happy." "With that face, child! There was a woman once--perhaps you know her--whose lover went away and never came back. Perhaps he was dead; perhaps he had forgotten. You look as if your lover had never come back." Pamela covered her face with her hands. "There, child! I don't want to distress you, but I am in trouble about you. What if he came back, after all?" "He never will." "He looked as if he would. Anyhow, if he never did, it would be better to be like that woman--a little cracked, perhaps, and always expecting her lover, till she woke up one day dying, and in her right mind--it would be better to be like her than to marry without love." Pamela trembled, but her face was hidden. "Tell me, Pam. You won't mind confiding in an old woman who has only a few days more to live. What did you do it for? It wasn't the money, and all it could bring, attracted you?" [Illustration: "Tell me, Pam. You won't mind confiding in an old woman."] "No, oh, no!" "I thought not. What was it?" "You don't know how good he is." "That's not enough, Pam, though it might serve if your heart were free. What is that to make you give up your life, your freedom to think, to hope, to pray? It will be one long struggle, Pamela. You will be like a creature in prison, for whom the free world were paradise enough." "I know Glengall is good," she went on. "Another girl might come to love him, in spite of his grey hairs, but not you, Pam. One sees clearer when one is going to leave all this. Why did you do it, Pam?" "It is too late to ask." "Why, Pam?" "Partly because my father must winter abroad and we had no money. Partly, too, because I was angry with--with someone I loved, and I thought I would get rid of the anger and the thought of him if I were married." "Minx would have taken care of your father. It was a useless sacrifice, Pamela." She looked at her a minute hesitatingly. "My people, those of them who survive, are rich. I could take care of you, too, Pam." "It is too late to make any difference." "It is not too late while you are yet free." "You don't know how good he is. And he has ordered his future life so that I shall always be the centre of it. I can't break his heart." "If Lord Glengall knew, he would be the first to set you free." "He would, because he is all unselfishness. But he will never know." "How will you keep it from him?" "I shall learn to love him."