"Please ask if she will see me," said Janet. "I am her daughter-in-law."
The girl ran upstairs, and in a minute or so a lady came down to speak to them. Janet recognized her as one of the Thompson nieces of whom Mrs. Rayburn used to talk so much.
"Mrs. Rayburn, my aunt is too ill to see any one but you," she began; "Mr. Rayburn must excuse her. Indeed, I have had great work to persuade her to see you; she is in such a state of nerves. She is very ill, and has been worse ever since she had a letter from you."
Anna Thompson was looking curiously at the two young people all this time. Janet turned to her husband.
"Will you go back to the station, Fred, or will you wait here?"
"Come in and wait in the parlour. My mother is there," said Miss Thompson. So they went to the parlour, while she took Janet upstairs.
"My aunt is a very secret woman," she said. "We know she has something on her mind, but she never talks of it. This is her room."
She led Janet in, and, going over to the window, took up some work that lay there, and sat down.
Mrs. Rayburn lay watching Janet with a strange gleam in her eyes, but she did not speak. Janet went up to the bed.
"Don't you know me, Mrs. Rayburn?"