"Denis," said Nell, "let’s!" She turned to him; her cheeks were flushed pink, her breath came in quick little pants between her lips. "Right you are!" She ran towards the door, but Ted barred her way. "I’m a mere cautious Englishman," he said, with an uncomfortable little laugh. "I want to remind you—" She danced before him, her hands over her ears. "I know it all by heart, Teddie. ’Tis mere waste of breath to tell it me all over again. And if you died for want of breath through telling me, I shouldn’t understand any more than I do now, not if you went on and on for ever! ’The shares,’" her laughing voice sobered, echoed his ponderously, "’have only gone up a little. It is true that they continue to go up, but they may never pay a high enough dividend to enable you to return to Kilbrannan.’ There, don’t I know it all?" Suddenly she dropped her hands, her lips quivered. "I must tell them, oh, I must! Even if—if—it comes to nothing,—oh, we must risk it, mustn’t we, Denis? Sheila Pat—" She turned and went over to the window. Ted looked as if all the cares of the state sat upon his shoulders. Denis said:— "We’ve kept it from them till it’s pretty well certain—" "You can’t tell," put in Ted, moodily. "Well, they’ll face it somehow, whatever happens. And meanwhile—why, man, think what it’ll mean to them! Come along, Nell!" Molly and Sheila Pat were downstairs trying to play a duet on the piano. When Nell and Denis went in, Sheila Pat glanced round; her eyes widened suddenly, her hand fell with a little crash of notes on the keyboard. She sat staring at Nell; a little quiver went through her. "Yes—yes—oh, Atom!" Nell cried out. She left Molly to Denis. She went closer to Sheila Pat, and told her—told her breathlessly, almost incoherently, her words hurrying one over the other. Sheila Pat sat awhile, rigid on the stool, then suddenly she slipped to the floor, she ran at Nell, her arms held out: "Nell—oh, Nell!" Nell held her close, whispering to her, and Sheila Pat cried, with never a thought of the hurt to her dignity. That night when ready for bed she turned to Nell. "Nell," she said in very dignified tones, "please don’t wait." She stood, a small figure in her white nightgown, her face very tired, her eyes very bright. Nell, looking at her, thought suddenly of the time she had been so ill. A little shiver went through her. "Why not, sweet?" she said. "I shall be a long while over my prayers, you see. It worries me to have you waitin’; I’ve got a good deal to say to God to-night." As Nell left the room, the Atom’s voice pursued her:— "Nell, I do want to be very perlite to-night. Don’t you think I’d better call him _Mister_ God?" *CHAPTER XXXVI*