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It struck her with an odd sense of strangeness as she went in; she scarcely knehy; she told herself it was because of what she had heard of hi flowers on the table and mantelshelf, and a pleasant fire on the hearth It was even reassuring after she had been there a -room where she had sat with hiht of the thahen the boy had behaved so foolishly Here, too, was a fire, a tall porter's chair drawn on one side with its back to the door, and a deep leather couch set opposite There was a box of Laurie's cigarettes set ready on the table--candles,

But she stood looking on it all for a few moments with an odd ee There was an air of expectation about it all Then on a sudden the emotions precipitated themselves in tenderness Ah! poor Laurie

"It is all perfectly right," she said to the old lady

"Are the cigarettes there?"

"Yes: I noticed them particularly"

"And flowers?"

"Yes, flowers too"

"What tiie peered at the clock

"It's just after six, Auntie Will you have the candles?"

The old lady shook her head

"No, ht Why hasn't the boy co hihed the old lady "My head's bad again"

"Poor dear," said Maggie

"Sit down, my dearest, for a few minutes You'll hear the wheels from here No, don't talk or read"

There, then, the toht was falling, layer on layer, over the spring garden, in a great stillness The chilly wind of the afternoon had dropped, and there was scarcely a sound to be heard fros about the house that once th Yet over all, to the Catholic's mind at least, there lay a shadow of death, fro, hour by hour

As to what Maggie thought during those iven afterwards no coherent description Matters were too complicated to think clearly; she knew so little; there were so many hypotheses Yet one ee of fear Here she sat, in this peaceful room, with all the homely paraphernalia of convalescence about her--the fire, the bed laid invitingly open with a couple of books, and a reading-lamp on the little table at the side, the faint smell of sandalwood; and before the fire dozed a peaceful old lady full too of gentle expectation of her son, yet knowing nothing whatever of the vague perils that were about him, that had, indeed, whatever they were, already closed in on hih the country lanes