Guy Walbridge did not die. He was very ill, and many weeks passed before his mother could bring him back to England; but after the first part of her stay in Paris he was out of danger, and her letters, particularly those she wrote to Caroline Breeze, showed that she was having a happy time. One of these letters had perhaps better be given, as it explains a good many things. She went to Paris on the 13th of February. This letter was written the first Tuesday in March, and was dated at a boarding-house in the Rue St. Ferdinand. One evening after dinner Grisel, to whom Caroline had brought the letter in the afternoon, according to directions in it, read it aloud to Oliver and Jenny Wick and Sir John Barclay, as they sat round the fire in the girls' room.

"She really seems to be having a good time," Grisel began, taking the thin sheets out of the envelope and throwing the end of her cigarette into the fire. "I'm glad too. She needed a change."

Barclay smiled at her. "Isn't it," he asked, "the first change your mother has ever had?"

She nodded. "Yes. I know you think we're awful, the way we treat her, John," she added, "but she never wanted to go away. I think her best holidays have always been when we were all off staying somewhere, and she had the house to herself."

"I don't," commented Jenny Wick, with a shrewd little grimace. "I think she likes best to have you one at a time—all to herself."

Oliver said nothing. It was the second time that he had been to the house since his return, but the first in which he had been there quite in this way—en famille—for the two brothers-in-law were there on the other occasion, and there had been things about the journey to Paris that he had not cared to tell them.

"Well, never mind that," he said. "Go on with the letter."

"'My dear Caroline,'—The first part's about—oh, about Caroline's landlady's twins—not very interesting. Let me see. Oh, here we are: 'We've been for a long drive in the Bois de Boulogne. You've no idea how different it is from Hyde Park, but it's very nice, just the same.'"

"Speaks the Islander," from Wick.

"'It is very cold here, colder, I think, than London, but it's clear and sunny. I feel very well, and in the last few days I have begun to get fatter; you'll be surprised to hear, Caroline, that I've had to let out my afternoon dress. I got a very nice piece of——' Oh, I won't read this."

"Yes, do," shouted Oliver. "I want to know what she got a nice piece of."

"'Of lace at the Galleries Lafayette, and a little woman here has made me a fichu that quite brightens up the old black satin.' Isn't she a dear? 'I went to Notre Dame this morning. It's beautiful, and I like the homely way poor people come in and say their prayers for a few minutes and then go out again. There were two market baskets full of vegetables just inside the door this morning, and a flower-girl burning candles before a statue. Of course it's idolatrous, but it's a very pretty custom.'"

Oliver laughed. "Imagine one of the Piccadilly Circus flower-girls strolling in for a moment's spiritual comfort to Westminster Abbey!"

"'I bought some very nice scones at a little shop near the Louvre, and Guy did enjoy them with his tea. But guess what they cost, my dear. Fifty centimes apiece—sixpence! The prices here are perfectly dreadful. Oh, I bought E.V. Lucas's "Wanderer in Paris," and go out for a couple of hours every day, when Guy doesn't want me, with it, and it's very delightful. Paris must have changed very much, and no one could call it gay now, and I never saw such deep mourning in my life. Half the women are in black, real old-fashioned widows' weeds, not like our war widows' little ballet skirts.

"'It's quite as east-windy and dusty as London, and the taximen are perfect fiends. They say that the family of anyone killed by a vehicle is obliged to pay for obstructing the traffic. Of course if this is true, it explains why they drive so fast.'"

Sir John laughed. "This, I take it, is the novelistic imagination of which we hear so much."

"'Thanks very much for sending me "Haycocks" and "Bess Knighthood." I've read "Haycocks," and like it very much in some ways, but as for "Bess Knighthood," how could it have taken that prize? Fancy getting a thousand pounds for such a book! I saw it at Brentano's, and the man told me everybody was reading it. I think it's rather a cruel book, and I don't believe any family could really be quite so horrid.'"

Grisel looked up. "That's true. They were perfect brutes, weren't they? Poor old Mum! I suppose she's a little jealous. I loved it myself!"

"It's going to be dramatised. Did I tell you, Grisel?" Wick lighted a cigarette as he spoke. "It'll make a splendid play. I never heard of the author before, did you? E.R. East. Man or woman?"

"Oh, woman, of course. No, I don't think I ever heard of her before. What a wonderful thing," Grisel added, "to get a thousand pounds prize just for writing a story."

"Just for writing a story." Wick grinned. "Philistine!"

"Oh, mother speaks about that—listen:

"'Do you remember that day, Caroline dear, when you wanted me to write a book for the competition? Just imagine "Sunlight and Shadow" or "One Maid's Word" being judged by the Committee that awarded that thousand pounds!"

"Poor mother. I mustn't forget to tell her when I write that Mr. Payne wrote a very nice letter about her new book. It's coming out in a few days. I do hope it'll be a success, poor darling. You know, it's a dreadful thing, John, but I can't get through a book of mother's nowadays."

"Can't you, my dear?"

"No. They are about such dull people. I wish I liked them, because she must know I don't."

"Oh, she's used to that," he answered. "Paul is remarkably frank about it. But go on; finish the letter."

The next page was devoted to a description of the famous pictures and statues which Mrs. Walbridge was making a point of seeing. It was plainly a surprise to her that this had turned out to be not altogether an unpleasant fulfilment of duty.

"'I really love some of the pictures,' she explained naÏvely, 'and I almost forgot to come home for lunch the day I went to the Luxembourg. Some day I shall try to make time to go to the National Gallery.'"

Wick groaned. "Oh—oh dear! She's like a child," he said. "Why, do you know, she positively trembled with excitement when the train stopped and she first noticed one of those long, straight roads edged with poplars—the kind that are always in illustrated magazines. She even thought the fisher wives with their caps picturesque. I'm going to take her on some sprees in London when she gets back. We're going to the Tower together, and she wants to see the Cathedral at St. Albans."

"'There's a lady in the house,'" Grisel began again, after an unamiable glance at the young man, "'who's been buying clothes to go to South America with. Yesterday I went with her to two or three dressmakers, and the things really are lovely, Caroline. Of course they seem very young, and one or two of this Mrs. Hammerton's would have looked to me childish on Grisel, but it's the fashion here, and they certainly do wear their clothes better than we do. I've got a lovely hat for Grisel—black. (All the prettiest hats seem to be black.) And Hermy will be delighted with an evening frock I have got for her. Maud's box went off the other day. You never saw such darling little things in your life. I wish I could be home to help nurse her, but Dr. Butler won't let Guy come back for a long time yet, and he wants us to go to Cannes at the end of next week. Doesn't it seem odd that I should be travelling about like this at my time of life? I wonder if the Mediterranean really is as blue as people say! I wish Oliver was going to be here. I rather dread the journey, although Guy really speaks good French now.

"'I wish, my dear, you would go and see Ferdie and look over his things. It would be perfectly safe for you to go, as you aren't one of the family. I had a very nice letter from him the other day—about Guy, of course—but he seems to feel it rather difficult to look after his own underclothes, and so on. I don't suppose he has a whole sock to his name——'"

Grisel broke off and looked round her audience. "Isn't that just like Mum?" she said. "I suppose she'll be mending Mrs. Crichell's—no, Mrs. Walbridge's—things by this time next year."

"I saw Crichell to-day," said Sir John gravely. "The case is down one of the first in the Trinity term. They've got all the evidence and so on. Ugh! What a beastly business it is! The woman ought to be whipped; and as for your father, my dear——" He broke off, and Grisel laughed.

"Oh, go on. Don't spare father. I'm sure I don't mind what you say about him. Paul saw him dining somewhere with the—lady who has sold herself as scapegoat. I should think there would be a good deal of money in that kind of job nowadays. Quite an idea!" she added flippantly.

"Oh, shut up, Grisel." It was Jenny who spoke.

But Grisel sat with the letter on her lap. An idea had occurred to her—an idea that would have occurred to anyone less self-engrossed than she many weeks before.

"John," she burst out, "is father still in that office of yours?"

"Yes."

"But—but how can he stay? Wouldn't you rather have him go?"

Barclay came back to his chair. "No," he said quietly. "I prefer to have him stay."

"But——" She flushed and rose. "But how can he stay and take your money when you feel about him as you do?"

"It's quite all right, my dear. Business is one thing and friendship another."

But she over-rode his words. "Nonsense! You only gave him a job—well, it's a kind of charity now that you're no longer friends."

"Nonsense, Grisel." It was Wick who spoke. "You don't seriously think that Sir John would have given your father the job unless he knew he was going to be useful? Business men don't do that kind of thing. Isn't that right, sir?"

Barclay bowed his head. "Yes. It is your father's knowledge of French that is of value to me. His domestic difficulties have made no change in that."

Grisel had forgotten all about little Jenny, with whom she was not very intimate, and went on rapidly, her pride aflame.

"Is he going to stay on in your—in your employ, then, after his marriage to that disgusting woman?"

"I hope so. You forget," Barclay added in a grave voice, "that if your father were not working he would be unable to continue to support your mother and——" he hesitated a little "you."

She shivered and went to the fire. "I see. Yes, I see," she murmured. Then she picked up the letter again, and read them a detailed account of what the doctor had told her mother about Guy's condition. The letter ended by asking Miss Breeze to take it to "Happy House," as the writer was too busy to set it all down a second time.

Grisel folded it up, and put it back into the envelope.

"My mother had a note from her," Wick remarked, "two or three days ago, it was. And she sent Jenny two pairs of gloves. I like to think," he added, "of her there in Paris running about with the E.V. Lucas under her arm, seeing things she has always heard of. She also," he added, "wrote a charming note to Miss Perkins."

"Did she? Has Miss Perkins written to her?"

He nodded. "Yes. She was awfully touched by the letter. So was Mrs. Perkins. Your mother's promised to go and see them as soon as she gets home."

Grisel smiled with a touch of condescension. "By the way, as she's so confined to the house by her mother's health, you might take me to see her one afternoon. Or—or Sir John would let us go in the car."

Sir John nodded. "Any day you say, my dear."

Wick was terrified for a moment, and then agreed to the proposal with becoming enthusiasm.

"That would be kind of you," he answered. "I've been longing to suggest it, but didn't quite like to."

She looked at him sideways, and he saw her knuckles whiten.

"When can you go?" he went on, pursuing his advantage with a beaming face. "Could you go to-morrow?"

"I'm afraid I've got to go to Derby," Sir John put in. "I'm motoring two men down on rather important business."

"And on Friday," Grisel added hastily, "I've an engagement."

"What about Saturday?" he insisted, thoroughly enjoying himself.

"Saturday I'm going to be with Maud all day."

He shrugged his shoulders. "There you are! Always busy. But I do want you to meet Doll. I'm sure you'll like her. She's awfully interested in you. I think," he added fatuously as his downright little sister stared at him in amazement approaching open-mouthed astonishment, "she was inclined to be—well, it sounds ridiculous, but girls are all alike—to be a little jealous of you just at first, Grisel. But of course that's all right now."

Grisel tossed her head. "I should think so," she retorted.

Sir John watched them with a puzzled look in his clear eyes. Their talk seemed to him to be in surprisingly bad taste. He had noticed before that the subject of Miss Perkins seemed to bring out in them both a quality that he could not define, but that he greatly disliked, and it was odd that Grisel at such moments displeased him far more than young Wick. He was a clear-sighted man who had seen a good deal of the world, and of course it had not escaped him that Wick must only very recently have been in love with Grisel, for sometimes he had caught in the young man's eyes a look that was at least reminiscent of a stronger feeling than Miss Perkins might have approved of. He felt a mild curiosity about Miss Perkins, whose photograph he had seen, and whose beauty was undeniable, and he remembered that the last time Wick had been at the house he had dropped on the floor, and left, a fat letter in a delicate grey envelope, addressed in a pretty hand, and that Grisel, who had found it, remarked, as he propped it up against a brass candlestick: "Chiswick postmark. Miss Perkins, of course."

Barclay reflected, as he walked home that night, that if it were not for Miss Perkins he should feel extremely sorry for young Wick. He liked the boy. He liked him for his initiative and general air of success. Incidentally he knew through a friend who was high up in the hierarchy in Fleet Street, of which the head was a man whom Oliver called his Chief, of this youth's recent and rapid promotion, and the confidential position to which he had been raised over the heads of dozens of more experienced and older men. He had said nothing of these things at "Happy House," and so far as he could judge Oliver was regarded there still as the unimportant, though pushful reporter, who had been sent to write up Hermione's wedding in the previous July. Why the young man was concealing his remarkable advance Barclay had no idea. But he did not consider it his business to tell what he knew, and even Wick himself had no idea of his rival's information. "The beautiful Miss Perkins," the elder man thought, as he walked along in the bright moonlight, "will be My Lady before she has been married five years, or I'm very much mistaken."

Meantime, Wick, who now had a room in a little blind alley off Fleet Street, was toiling upstairs thoroughly tired in every sense. He had expected Miss Perkins to effect a quicker revolution than she had been able to do. He was overworked, for the great man who had taken him in hand was testing him at every point, and things were not being made easy for him; that was not the great man's way. He had, moreover, to contend with the very natural jealousy of a good many men at the office, over whose resentful heads he had been promoted, and their protests were none the less bitter because they were forced to be silent ones. Criticism of the Chief's plans, or even whims, were not tolerated in Fleet Street. Wick found his work hampered and retarded in every possible way, but he was too clever to speak a word of protest during his rare but fruitful interviews with the "Boss," whose eyes twinkled as he asked him each time that they met: "Well, Mr. Wick, things going well, I hope?" And Wick, knowing that he knew (for he knew everything), that things were being made damnably hard for him, invariably answered with a corresponding twinkle and a pugnacious tightening of the lips: "Top-hole." But now, after this second evening he had spent at "Happy House" since his return from Paris, he was worn out and discouraged, and he sat down on the edge of his bed, the moonlight pouring in through the uncurtained window, and allowed his face to drop and line without restraint.

"I'll go and see mother to-morrow," he said aloud, "and tell her all about it. She'll set me right, if I'm settable. The only decent thing in the whole world is that Mrs. Walbridge is having the time of her life in Paris, bless her! What a stupid letter!" He took a letter from his pocket and tossed it on to the dressing-table. "I wonder what they would say if they could read mine! Ah, well."

As he got into bed and blew out his candle, he groaned heavily. "Damn Miss Perkins," he said.