From the Spencers she heard irregularly. Earlier in the winter the letters had been more frequent: nervously anxious epistles of some length from Mrs. Merideth; stilted notes, half protesting, half pleading, from Ned; and short, but wonderfully sympathetic communications from Frank. Later Frank had fallen very ill with a fever of some sort, and Mrs. Merideth and Ned had written only hurried little bulletins from the sick-room. Then had come the good news that Frank was out of danger, though still far too weak to undertake the long journey home. Their letters showed unmistakably their impatience at the delay, and questioned her as to her health and welfare, but could set no date for their return. Frank, in particular, was disturbed, they said. He had not planned to leave either herself or the mills so long, it being his intention when he went away merely to take a short trip with his sister and brother, and then hurry back to America alone. As for Frank himself--he had not written her since his illness. Margaret was thinking of all this, and was feeling specially forlorn as she sat alone in the little sitting-room at the Mill House one evening in early April. She held a book before her, but she was not reading; and she looked up at once when Patty entered the room. "I'm sorry ter trouble ye," began Patty, hesitatingly, "but Bobby McGinnis is here an' wanted me ter ask ye----" Margaret raised an imperious hand. "That's all right, Patty," she said so sharply that Patty opened wide her eyes; "but suppose you just ask Bobby McGinnis to come here to me and ask his question direct. I will see him now." And Patty, wondering vaguely what had come to her gentle-eyed, gentle-voiced mistress--as she insisted upon calling Margaret--fled precipitately. Two minutes later Bobby McGinnis himself stood tall and straight just inside the door. "You sent for me?" he asked. Margaret sprang to her feet. All the pent loneliness of the past weeks and months burst forth in a stinging whip of retort. "Yes, I sent for you." She paused, but the man did not speak, and in a moment she went on hurriedly, feverishly. "I always send for you--if I see you at all, and yet you know how hard I'm trying to help these people, and that you are the only one here that can help me." She paused again, and again the man was silent. "Don't you know what I'm trying to do?" she asked. "Yes." The lips closed firmly over the single word. "Didn't I ask you to help me? Didn't I appoint us a committee of two to do the work?" Her voice shook, and her chin trembled like that of a grieved child. "Yes." Again that strained, almost harsh monosyllable. Margaret made an impatient gesture. "Bobby McGinnis, why don't you help me?" she demanded, tearfully. "Why do you stand aloof and send to me? Why don't you come to me frankly and freely, and tell me the best way to deal with these people?"