"Kiss him and tell him you are waiting in the next room and can come back any moment. What the hospital leaves free of Coombe House is at your disposal."
"God bless you! Oh, forgive me!"
"He escaped from a German prison by some miracle. He must be made to forget. He must hear of nothing but happiness. There is happiness before him—enough to force him to forget. You will accept anything he tells you as if it were a natural thing?"
"Accept!" she cried. "What would I not accept, praising God! You are preparing me for something. Ah! don't, don't be afraid! But—is it maiming—darkness?"
"No! No! It is a perfect thing. You must know it before you see him—and be ready. Before he went to the Front he was married."
"Married!" in a mere breath.
Coombe went on in quick sentences. She must be prepared and she could bear anything in the rapture of her joy.
"He married in secret a lonely child whom the Dowager Duchess of Darte had taken into her household. We have both taken charge of her since we discovered she was his wife. We thought she was his widow. She has a son. Before her marriage she was Robin Gareth-Lawless."
"Ah!" she cried brokenly. "He would have told me—he wanted to tell me—but he could not—because I was so hard! Oh! poor motherless children!"