It was as the Major said.  The lodge-keepers asked no questions, and they passed up the drive, through the silence of an overgrowth of laurels and rhododendrons.  Then the park opened before their eyes.  Nellie rolled on the short, crisp, worn grass, or chased the dragonflies; the spreading trees enchanted her, and, looking at the house—­a grey stone building with steps, pillars, and pilasters, hidden amid cedars and evergreen oaks—­she said, ’I never saw anything so beautiful; is that where the Major goes when he leaves us?  Look at the flowers, Mother, and the roses.  May we not go in there—­I don’t mean into the house?  I heard the Major ask you not to go in for fear we should meet the housemaids—­but just past this railing, into the garden?  Here is the gate.’  The child stood with her hand on the wicket, waiting for reply:  the mother stood as in a dream, looking at the house, thinking vaguely of the pictures, the corridors, and staircases, that lay behind the plate-glass windows.

‘Yes; go in, my child.’

The gardens were in tumult of leaf and bloom, and the little girl ran hither and thither, gathering single flowers, and then everything that came under her hands, binding them together in bouquets—­one for mother, one for the Major, and one for herself.  Mrs Shepherd only smiled a little bitterly when Nellie came running to her with some new and more splendid rose.  She did not attempt to reprove the child.  Why should she?  Everything here would one day be hers.  Why then should the present be denied them?  And so did her thoughts run as she walked across the sward following Nellie into the beech wood that clothed the steep hillside.  The pathway led by the ruins of some Danish military earthworks, ancient hollows full of leaves and silence.  Pigeons cooed in the vast green foliage, and from time to time there came up from the river the chiming sound of oars.  Rustic seats were at pleasant intervals, and, feeling a little tired, Mrs Shepherd sat down.  She could see the river’s silver glinting through the branches, and, beyond the river, the low-lying river lands, dotted with cattle and horses grazing, dim already with blue evening vapours.  In the warm solitude of the wood the irreparable misfortune of her own life pressed upon her:  and in this hour of lassitude her loneliness seemed more than she could bear.  The Major was good and kind, but he knew nothing of the weight of the burden he had laid upon her, and that none should know was in this moment a greater weight than the burden itself.  Nellie was exploring the ancient hollows where Danes and Saxons had once fought, and had ceased to call forth her discoveries when Mrs Shepherd’s bitter meditation was broken by the sudden sound of a footstep.

The intruder was a young lady.  She was dressed in white, her pale gold hair was in itself an aristocracy, and her narrow slippered feet were dainty to look upon.  ‘Don’t let me disturb you,’ she said.  ’This is my favourite seat; but I pray you not to move, there is plenty of room.’  So amiable was she in voice and manner that Mrs Shepherd could not but remain, although she had already recognized the girl as one of the Major’s sisters.  Fearing to betray herself, greatly nervous, Mrs Shepherd answered briefly Miss Shepherd’s allusions to the beauty of the view.  At the end of a long silence Miss Shepherd said—­