“Pleased to see you, Miss Thorold,” Oliver touched his hat with his whip and gave her his friendly smile of welcome. “A bad business this about the little girl. They’re all very upset at Tetherstones.”

“I am sure they must be,” Frances said. “What a terribly sad business, Oliver! Who was it found her?”

“I found her,” said Oliver. “But we thought she was with you and no one missed her at first. She’d been lying there all night and a good part of the day before she was missed. We’d been busy, you see—” he jerked the reins—“busy with other things. Then Maggie came out to me and said you were gone and the little one couldn’t be found, and I went straight away to the Stones to look for her. She was lying just under the Rocking Stone unconscious, and I carried her back. She’s come to herself since, but they say she’s somehow different—that she’ll never be the same again—that she—” He broke off to cough and flicked the horse’s ears with his whip. They clattered over the rough stones of the street for some distance in silence. After a while he spoke again. “She’s only a child—a bit of a baby—but she isn’t like others I’ve ever seen. Maggie is just breaking her heart over her.”

“Poor Maggie!” said Frances gently.

“Yes.” He nodded acquiescence. “Maggie and Nan—Ruth’s mother—were always the pals, you see. There was only a year between them. Nan was Arthur’s favourite sister too. He’s feeling it pretty badly—though he’d sooner die than let anyone know.”

Frances felt her heart contract. She said nothing.

They were out upon the open moor road before Oliver volunteered anything further. Then, somewhat abruptly, with a sidelong glance at her, he said, “It’s decent of you to come back to us after the fright you had.”

“I am only coming for little Ruth’s sake,” Frances said.

“Yes, I know. The doctor told me. I didn’t think he’d get you to come,” said Oliver frankly. “You’d had a pretty bad scare. But it might have been worse, I suppose. The fellow wasn’t much damaged, was he?”

There was curiosity in his tone tempered with a reticence that she was quick to detect. A sharp sense of anger surged within her.

“It was no thanks to—to—the man who shot him that he wasn’t killed,” she said.

“No. I know,” said Oliver. He added after a moment, “Anyway I did my best to prevent it. It wasn’t my fault that it happened.”

She turned upon him. “But—surely you didn’t know it was going to happen?” she said.

He lifted his shoulders. “No, I didn’t know, Miss Thorold. But I did know the chap was in danger. I told you so, didn’t I?”

“But why—why?” said Frances.

He gave her again that sidelong glance. “Can’t always account for things,” he said. “We’re a good long way from towns and civilization here.”

“But he might have been killed!” she said.

He nodded. “So he might. But he wasn’t. That’s all that matters. Where is he now?”

“He has gone to town,” she said.

“Then, if he’s a wise man, he’ll stop there,” said Oliver with finality, and whipped up his horse.

The day was soft and cloudy, the tors wrapped in mist. There was a feeling of rain in the air and the sweetness of rain-filled streams. She heard the rushing of unseen water as they trotted over the winding moorland road. It filled her with a great sadness, a longing indescribable to which she could give no name.

She asked no more questions of Oliver, for she knew instinctively that she would receive no actual enlightenment from him. Moreover, something within her shrank from discussing Arthur Dermot and Arthur Dermot’s motives with a third person. Any explanation, she felt, must come from the man himself.

They drove on up the stony road, drawing nearer and nearer to the great boulder-strewn tors, hearing the vague bleatings of sheep in the desolation but seeing no living thing upon their way. Again the eeriness of the place began to possess Frances. It was a relief to her when Oliver said abruptly, “We won’t go by the Stones.”

She believed it to be the quicker route, but it was rough, and she was thankful that he proposed to avoid it. Her dread of Tetherstones was growing with every yard they covered, but there was no turning back now. She could only go forward to whatever might be in store.

The mist gradually descended to meet them and turned to a small rain, drifting in their faces. The chill of the moor laid a clammy touch upon them. Frances shivered in spite of herself.

Oliver shot her his shrewd glance. “They’ll be awfully pleased to see you,” he said, and added, “We’re nearly there.”

Yes, they were nearly there. The atmosphere of Tetherstones seemed to be reaching out to receive them—the old grey place from which she had fled as from a prison.

They turned down the steep lane, and the scent of wet honeysuckle came to Frances mingling with the bog-myrtle of the moors. Something rose in her throat and she turned her face aside. She had fled from the place as from a prison, yet, returning, that exquisite scent came back to her as the breath of home.

They reached the white gate, standing wide to receive them, and drove through to the garden where Roger met them with extravagant antics of delight. His welcome sent a warmth to her heart that in some fashion eased the unacknowledged pain there. She approached the old stone doorway with more assurance.

Oliver saluted and turned the horse; she heard him driving round to the stables as she entered.

The door stood open according to custom. The passage was dark, but she heard someone moving in the kitchen and directed her steps thither, Roger bounding by her side. Then as she turned a corner there came the sudden tread of feet, and she drew back sharply. She was face to face with Arthur Dermot.

He also checked himself abruptly, and in a moment stood back against the wall to let her pass.

He did not attempt to address her, but she could not pass him so in his own house. She stood still.

But for a second or two her voice refused to serve her, and he made an odd movement as if to compel her to pass on. Then with a sharp effort she spoke.

“Little Ruth—I have come to see her. Is she—is she——”

“Dying—yes,” he said. “It was—good of you to come. Nell and Lucy are in the kitchen. If you like, I will tell them you are here.”

“Oh no,” she said. “No. I will go to them.”

She passed him quickly, thankful to escape, hearing his heavy tread as he went on, with that old fateful feeling at her heart. She wondered what he really thought of her for returning thus.

She found the two girls in the kitchen, very subdued and troubled though they gave her a ready welcome.

“We’ve missed you dreadfully,” said Nell. “And little Ruth has hardly left off crying for you all these days.” Her lip quivered. “Dr. Square said he should go and tell you after your letter came—but I didn’t think you’d come.”

“I had to come,” Frances said.

“I thought you would if you really knew how badly you were wanted,” said Lucy.

“I didn’t,” said Nell. “I knew you wouldn’t stay that day of the row. I told you so, didn’t I? And I never thought you’d come back. I told Arthur you wouldn’t. Only you would have done it.”

She looked at Frances with warm admiration in her eyes.

“You’re a brick,” she said. “And we’ll none of us forget it. You might run and tell Dolly, Lucy. Now sit down, Miss Thorold, and I’ll get you a glass of milk.”

She bustled round the old raftered kitchen, and Frances, sitting in the horsehair arm-chair, tried to forget that awful night when she had awaked as from a nightmare to find herself lying before the great fireplace—a prisoner.

“Where are your mother and Maggie?” she asked, when Nell brought her the milk.

“Mother is in the study with the old man,” said Nell. “Maggie is out somewhere. She and Elsie were getting hay down from the loft a few minutes ago. The work has got to go on, you know, whoever lives or dies.” She checked a sob upon the words.

Frances leaned forward and held her hand. “Tell me about little Ruth!” she said.

“Oh, there isn’t much to tell. She went to look for you the night you left. You had a fright, didn’t you? So did we. There was a frightful row after you were gone, and we all of us forgot to wonder where she was till the morning. Then Oliver found her—found her—” Nell choked and recovered herself. “It was up by the Stones. She’d been there heaps of times before and never come to any harm. But this time she must have gone right up on to the Rocking Stone and overbalanced. She was lying under it, and she’d been there for twelve hours or more, poor little darling. She was unconscious when Oliver found her, but she hadn’t been all the time. She keeps on talking about it, about being a prisoner under that stone and begging God to set her free so that she can go to you. She has got a rooted idea that you are in trouble. You’re not, are you? Everything’s all right with you?” She looked down at Frances piteously, through tears.

“Don’t you bother your head about me, my dear!” said Frances. “My affairs don’t count now.” She paused a moment, then, with some hesitation: “Will you tell me why there was such a disturbance after I went?” she asked.

“Oh, that!” said Nell, and also hesitated. “That’s one of the things we’re not supposed to talk about,” she said, after a moment. “You don’t mind, Miss Thorold? You’ll try to understand?”

“My dear, don’t you trouble!” said Frances very kindly. “I shall always try to understand.”

But even as she spoke she felt again that cold misgiving at her heart. What species of monster was this whom they all combined to shield?

Lucy came running down again with an eager message. Dolly said would she go up at once? Little Ruth was in their mother’s room. She would show her where it was.

Then, as they mounted the stairs together, she drew close to Frances and slipped a shy hand into her arm. “We have missed you so much,” she said.

Frances patted the hand without speaking. The warmth of her welcome touched her very deeply.

They traversed two or three rambling passages before they reached Mrs. Dermot’s room. It was over the kitchen, a low, oak-raftered apartment with an uneven floor. It contained two beds, and in one of these, close to a narrow, ivy-grown window, lay Ruth.

Her face was turned towards the door, and—it came upon Frances with a curious sense of shock—the eyes that had always till then been closed were open, wide open, and burning with a fire so spiritual, so unearthly, that for a moment she halted almost as one afraid. In that moment she realized very fully and beyond all possibility of doubt that little Ruth was dying.

Lucy’s soft touch drew her forward. She was aware of Dolly, pale and restrained, somewhere in the background, but she did not actually see her. She went to the child’s bedside as if she were entering a sanctuary.

Ruth greeted her instantly, but she lay like a waxen image with tiny hands folded on her breast.

“Have you come back at last, dear Miss Thorold?” she said, a thrill of gladness in her voice. “God told me you would in a dream last night.”

Frances knelt down by the bed and closely clasped the little folded hands that never stirred to her touch. “My little darling!” she said softly. “Have you been wanting me?”

The burning eyes were fixed upon her. It was as though in them alone the living spirit lingered. She was sure that the spirit saw her in that hour.

“Yes, I have wanted you,” the child said. “I have been calling you—crying for you—ever since that night. You said that you were coming then, but you never came.”

“I couldn’t,” whispered Frances.

“No. You had to go,” Ruth agreed, in her tired voice. “I knew that. But why didn’t you go to the Stones? You meant to go there, didn’t you?”

“I can’t tell you now, darling,” Frances said.

“It doesn’t matter,” said Ruth. “I think God didn’t want you to go. But I didn’t know that when I went to look for you. I thought you might be lost and frightened again—like you were that first night that I found you. And then—when you weren’t there—I was afraid something had happened to you. Did anything happen, dear Miss Thorold?”

“Nothing dreadful, sweetheart,” she answered softly.

“Then God took care of you,” Ruth said, with conviction. “There was something dreadful very near you—very near you; but He sent it away.”

Those blind eyes—the eyes of a visionary—kindled afresh with the words, and a sudden sense as of something vividly remembered smote Frances. She had seen those eyes before. Where? Where? Then it came to her—like a rending flash of lightning across a dark sky. The Bishop of Burminster had had that inner flame as of prophecy in his eyes on the night that he had denounced her. A great wave of feeling went through her. She had an overwhelming desire to shield herself, shrinking as one shrinks from the unsparing beam of a searchlight.

“We won’t talk of it now, darling,” she said almost pleadingly. “Try to go to sleep!”

“I don’t want to sleep,” said the child. “I want to give you a message, but it hasn’t come yet. And if I go to sleep, I shall forget it.”

“We will give her something to make her sleep presently,” said Dolly gently. “She isn’t in any pain—only a little tired. Take this chair, Miss Thorold! You must be tired too.”

So Frances sat down beside the bed to wait, as all in that house were waiting, for the coming of the Angel of Death.