It was long before Mrs Lawless turned her face in his direction; when she did he saw that her eyes were filled with a great hopelessness, and something that resembled dread. Unconsciously she fingered the roses in her lap, touching them with a nervous caressing hand. "I am afraid," she said, and looked at him wistfully. "I have never imagined anything like this... I thought I was going Home without ever seeing his face again. I had reconciled myself to that. And now... It ought not to be more difficult to part from the dead than to part irrevocably from the living. But it is." She looked down suddenly at the roses, and lifted them gently, and laid them against her face. "I brought them for him," she said simply. "I think it would be wiser," he returned, "not to make up your mind to misfortune. It is quite possible that when we arrive we shall find Mr Lawless in perfect health. There are absolutely no grounds for supposing otherwise." "I have a feeling that all is not well," she answered quietly. "That feeling was with me throughout the night; and in my sleep I heard him call me... My own imagination! ... Yes, I know. He wouldn't ask for me." She turned her face away and gazed out of the window again. "Do you think," she asked presently, after a further lengthy silence, and in her tone and manner it was apparent how great was the effort it cost her to touch upon the subject, "that she will be with him? ... that woman?" Colonel Grey sat up suddenly as though a bomb had been flung at him. He had forgotten since his knowledge of Tottie's identity that this thing had been an open scandal, and that she must know of it. "Good Lord, no!" he answered. And added quickly: "There wasn't any woman." He moved down to her end of the compartment, and leaning forward took both her hands and held them firmly. "You haven't allowed that to come between you?" he asked gently. The tears rose in her eyes. "It didn't help," she whispered... "But you see--I am going to him in spite of it." "It was a cruel thing to let you believe that," he said, and dropped her hands, and sat back against the cushions, watching her. "I'll tell you the story as I heard it myself yesterday." And he related to her unreservedly the history of Tottie and her connection with Lawless in the recovery of the letters. When he had finished he found that she was quietly weeping with her face hidden in her gloveless hands. He left her to herself and returning to his former seat sat stiffly upright, staring out of the window with unseeing eyes beneath their knitted brows. It would seem that those letters had more to answer for than even he had supposed. He wondered whether, could he have foreseen all that this enterprise would involve, he would have consented to its undertaking.