I boldly went down to the punch room, when I knew he was there one morning, and asked if I might speak to him.

” But of course, Miss Leigh,” he replied. ” It is always a pleasure to speak to you.”

I came straight to the point. ” I want to do something for Gilly.”

“Yes?”

” I do not believe she is half-witted. I think that no one has made any attempt to help her. I have heard about her accident. Before that, I understand, she was quite a normal little girl. Don’t you see that it might be possible to make her normal once again?”

I saw a return of that mockery to his eyes as he said lightly:

” I believe that as with God, so with Miss Leigh, all things are possible.”

I ignored the flippancy. ” I am asking your permission to give her lessons.”

” My dear Miss Leigh, does not the pupil you came here to teach take up all your time?”

” I have a little spare time, Mr. TreMellyn. Even governesses have that. I would be ready to teach Gilly in my own time, providing of course you do not expressly forbid it.”

” If I forbade you I am sure you would find some way of doing it, so I think it would be simpler if I say: Go ahead with your plans for Gilly. I wish you all success.”

” Thank you,” I said; and turned to go.

” Miss Leigh,” he called. I stood waiting.

“Let us go on that picnic soon. I could carry Alvean if necessary to and from the carriage.”

” That would be excellent, Mr. TreMellyn. I’ll tell her at once. I know it will delight her.”

” And you. Miss Leigh, does it delight you?”

For a moment I thought he was coming towards me and I started back. I was suddenly afraid that he would place his hands on my shoulders and that at his touch I might betray myself.

I said coolly: ” Anything which is going to be so good for Alvean delights me, Mr. TreMellyn.”

And I hurried back to Alvean to tell her the good news.

So the weeks passed—pleasurable, wonderful weeks which I sometimes felt could never be repeated.

I had taken Gilly to the schoolroom and I had even managed to teach her a few letters. She delighted in pictures and quickly became absorbed in them. I really believed she enjoyed our y lessons for she would present herself at the schoolroom each day at the appointed time.

She had been heard to speak a few words now and then and I knew that the whole household was watching the experiment with amusement and interest.

When Alvean was well enough to take lessons in the school room I should have to be prepared for opposition. Alvean’s aversion to Gilly was apparent. I had brought the child into the sick-room on one occasion and Alvean had immediately become sulky. I thought, when she is quite well I shall have to reconcile her to Gilly. But that was one of the problems of the future. I knew very well that when life returned to normal I could not expect these days of pleasure to continue.

There were plenty of visitors for Alvean. Celestine was there every day. She brought fruit and other presents for her. Peter came and she was always pleased to see him.

Once he said to her: ” Do you not think I am a devoted uncle to call and see you so often, Alvean?”

She had retorted: ” Oh, but you don’t come to see me only, do you.

Uncle Peter. You come mainly for Miss. “

He had replied in characteristic style: ” I come to see you both. How fortunate I am to have two such charming ladies on whom to call.”

Lady Treslyn called with expensive books and flowers for Alvean, but Alvean received her sullenly and would scarcely speak to her.

” She is an invalid still. Lady Treslyn,” I explained; and the smile which was flashed upon me almost took my breath away, so beautiful was it.

” Of course I understand,” Lady Treslyn told me. ” Poor child! Mr. TreMellyn tells me that she has been brave and you have been wonderful. I tell him how lucky he is to have found such a treasure. They are not easy to come by,” I said. I reminded him of how my last cook walked out in the middle of a dinner party. She was another such treasure.”

I bowed my head and hated her not because she had linked me in her mind with her cook, but because she was so beautiful, and I knew that rumours persisted about her and Connan and I feared that there was truth in them.

Connan seemed different when this woman was in the house. I felt he scarcely saw me. I heard the sounds of their laughter and I wondered sadly what they said to each other. I saw them in the gardens and I told myself there was an unmistakable intimacy in the very way they walked together.

Then I realised what a fool I had been, for I had been harbouring thoughts which I would not dare express, even to myself. I tried to pretend they did not exist. But they did-and in spite of my better sense they kept intruding.

I dared not look into the future.

Celestine one day suggested that she should take Alvean over to Mount Widden for the day and look after her there.

” It would be a change,” she said.

” Connan,” she added, ” you shall come to dinner, and you can bring her back afterwards.”

He agreed to do so. I was disappointed not to be included in the invitation; which showed what a false picture I had allowed myself to make of the situation during these incredible weeks. Imagine myself—the governess—invited to dine at Mount Widden!

I laughed at my own foolishness, but there was a note of bitterness and sadness. It was like waking up to a chilly morning after weeks of sunshine so brilliant that you thought it was going to last for ever; it was like the gathering of storm clouds in a summer sky.

Connan drove Alvean over in the carriage and I was left alone, for the first time since I arrived here without any definite duties.

I gave Gilly her lesson but I did not believe in taxing the child too much and when I had returned her to her grandmother I wondered what I was going to do.

Then an idea struck me. Why should I not go for a ride, a long ride?

Perhaps on the moors.

I immediately remembered that day when Alvean and I had ridden to her Great-Aunt Clara. I began to feel rather excited. I was remembering the mystery of Alice again, which I had forgotten during those halcyon weeks of Alvean’s convalescence. I began to wonder whether I had been so interested i in Alice’s story because I needed some interest to prevent me from brooding on my own.

I thought to myself, Great-Aunt Clara will want to hear how Alvean is getting on. In any case she had made it dear that I should be welcomed any time I called. Of course it would be different, calling without Alvean; but then I believed that she had been more interested to talk to me than to the child.

So I made up my mind.

I went to Mrs. Polgrey and said: ” Alvean will be away all day. I propose to take a day’s holiday.”

Mrs. Polgrey had become very fond of me since I had taken such an interest in Gilly. She really did love the child, I believed. It was merely because she had assumed that Gilly’s strangeness had been the price which had to be paid for her parents’ sins that she had accepted her as non compos mentis.

” And none deserves a holiday more. Miss,” she said to me. ” Where are you going?”

” I think I’ll go on to the moors. I’ll take luncheon at an inn.”

” Do you think you should, Miss, by yourself?”

I smiled at her. ” I am very well able to take care of myself, Mrs. Polgrey. “

” Well, there be bogs on the moor and mists and the Little People, some say.”

” Little People indeed!”

” Ah, don’ tee laugh at ‘em. Miss. They don’t like people to laugh at ‘em. There’s some as say they’ve seen ‘em. Little gnome-like men in sugar loaf hats. If they don’t like ‘ee they’ll lead ‘ee astray with their fairy lanterns, and afore you knows where you be you’m in the middle of a bog that sucks ‘ee down and won’t letee go however much you do struggle.”

I gave a shiver. ” I’ll be careful, and I wouldn’t dream of offending the Little People. If I meet any I’ll be very polite.”

” You’m mocking, Miss, I do believe.”

” I’ll be all right, Mrs. Polgrey. Don’t have any fears about me.”

I went to the stables and asked Tapperty which horse I could have today.

” There’s May Morning if you’d like her. She be free.”

I told him I was going to the moors. ” A good chance to see the country,” I added.

” Trust you, Miss. Bairi’t much you miss.” And he laughed to himself as though enjoying some private joke.

“You be going with a companion. Miss?” he asked slyly.

I said that I was going alone, but I could see that he did not believe me.

I felt rather angry with him because I guessed that his thoughts were on Peter Nansellock. I believed that my name had been coupled with his since he had been so foolish as to send Jacinth over for me.

I wondered too if my growing friendship with Connan had been noted. I was horrified at the possibility. Oddly enough I could bear to contemplate their sly remarks which I was sure were exchanged out of my hearing, about Peter and me; it would be a different matter if they talked in that way of me and Connan.

How ridiculous! I told myself as I walked May Morning out of the stables and down to the village.

There is nothing to talk about between you and Connan. But there is, I answered myself; and I fell to thinking of those two occasions when he had kissed me.

I looked across the cove at Mount Widden. Wistfully I hoped that I should meet Connan coming back. But I didn’t of course; he would stay there with Alvean and his friends. Why should I imagine that he would want to come back to be with me? I was letting this foolish habit of day dreaming get the better of my common sense.