She stood motionless on the landing. The crimson roses of the stained-glass of the window made her a splendid head-dress, and in the panels on each side spread branches of rosemary--rosemary for remembrance. Alas! she remembered but too well the words which had been spoken between the two people who had stood there long ago. “It is for you--it is all for you,” he had said. “I mean to make a name that shall be in some measure worthy of you.” Those were his words, and then she had looked up to his face and had put her hand, warm from the fire, into his hand. She had trusted him; and now-- “Is it a ghost?” cried Clare, laughing. “Are you a ghost, beautiful lady, or do you see a ghost?” She had gone along the hall to the foot of the half-dozen shallow oak steps beneath the window. “A ghost--a ghost,” said Agnes, descending. “Yes, I have seen a ghost.” Claude advanced to the middle of the hall to meet her. She greeted him silently. “I saw your ponies in the distance and hurried after you, hoping that you would ask me to lunch,” said he. “A woman's lunch!” she cried. “You cannot surely know what our menu is.” “I will take it on trust,” said he. “You represent company here. When I come to you I forget the loneliness of the Court.” When speaking he had looked first at Agnes, then at Clare. He seemed to take care to prevent the possibility of Agnes's fancying that he was addressing her individually when he said, “You represent company here.” “And you represent company to us; for the capacity of two lone women to feel lonely is quite as great as that of one man,” said she, smiling in her old way. “He brings us news, Agnes--good news,” said Clare. “He has got the medal of the--the society--what was the name that you gave the society, Mr. Westwood?” “The Geographical,” said he. “They have treated me well, I must confess. They have been compelled to take me on trust, so to speak--to accept my discoveries, without any demonstration on my part. No one knows anything of what I have seen or what I have done in Central Africa. The outline that was cabled home represented only the recollections of a missionary at Uganda. It is a little better than nonsense.” “That is the greater reason, I say, why you should take the opportunity that is offered to you now of letting the world know all that you have passed through,” said Clare. “All--all--all that I have passed through, did you say?” he cried. Then he laughed curiously. “Well, I don't suppose that you could tell all in an hour--I suppose they would give you an hour?” said Clare. “They might even make it two hours without forcing me to repeat myself,” said he. “But all--all! Good heavens! If I were to tell all! Luckily I cannot: the language has not got words adequate for the expression of some of the things that I saw. Still--well, I saw some few things that might be described.” “Then you will go? You will give them the lecture which you say they have invited you to deliver?” cried Clare.