"You never used to find it so," said Sylvia. "I remember the time when Carrickmoyle held all the delights for you." "That was when we were little girls in short frocks, and led poor Mick into scrapes." "Many a year ago," said Sylvia. "When you struck Anthony Trevithick with the sun-bonnet that was intended for the red cock----" Pamela's heightened colour assured Sylvia of what she wanted to know. "Pam," she said, "why don't you make it straight with Anthony Trevithick?" "How do you know there is anything to make straight?" "Rubbish!" said Sylvia, with quiet scorn. "Oh, Sylvia!" said Pamela, "you don't understand. I am tired of love and lovers. I only want to be let alone. I have suffered too much." "If you have, it's your own fault. You'd no business to take poor dear Glengall when you were in love with someone else, though how you could look at others in the same day with Glengall fairly bothers me. And now, why don't you write and ask Anthony Trevithick to come back?" "I don't want him to come back." "Yes, you do; you're crying your eyes out for him every night. Yes, you are. And why you let all this muddle go on without doing anything to prevent it I don't know. I could shake you, Pam!" "What would you have done, Sylvia?" "Well, supposing I was in love with a man and knew him to be in love with me, and supposing he went away and didn't write, I'd never think anything except that the letter was lost. If I could get at him, I'd write and ask him what it meant. If I couldn't, I'd go on believing in him, maybe till I was old and grey, and till I died, as some have done--if I really loved him, mind you." "Perhaps you are right, Sylvia." "There's no doubt about it, Madam Faint-Heart." "But come," she said, after a benevolent scrutiny of Pamela; "come, you look very nice, unless you'd like to put on the pink sun-bonnet. Anthony Trevithick is in the drawing-room." "Sylvia!" "Yes, I know I ought to have mentioned it before, instead of talking nonsense. The poor young man's on tenter-hooks." "Sylvia! I _can't_ go down." "Yes, you can. You shall, even if I have to use force." "Very well, Sylvia," said Pam, rising and trembling a little. "Come, don't think about it. Do it quickly, as we used to take our cod-liver oil long ago. Let us run down the stairs. There, you poor little thing! your hands are cold. The run will warm them." And, half-resisting, Pamela was pulled by force down the stairs. Nevertheless, she entered the room with her head high. "How do you do, Sir Anthony?" she began. "Ah, Pam darling!" cried the young man, coming to meet her. "Don't give me any more cold words or cold looks. I haven't deserved them, and if you've nothing else for me I shall go away for ever." "No, surely," said Pam, and her sweet voice had a little surprise in it. "You didn't really deserve any blame at all." "But you did, for I asked you to trust me, Pam. I asked you to trust me, and your faith was brittle." "So it was," said Pam.