The difficulty how to word it, so as to catch his attention and yet escape publicity, was very great, especially as his initials were so common.  Hundreds of “A.  L.’s” might be wandering away from home, to whom all that she dared say to call Ascott back would equally apply.  At last a bright thought struck her.

“A. leaf” (will a small l) “will be quite safe wherever found.  Come.  Saturday. 15.”

As she wrote it—­this wretched double-entendre—­she was seized with that sudden sense of the ludicrous which sometimes intrudes in such a ghastly fashion in the very midst of great misery.  She burst into uncontrollable laughter, fit after fit; so violent that Elizabeth, who came in by chance, was terrified out of her wits, and kneeling beside her mistress, implored her to be quiet.  At last the paroxysm ended in complete exhaustion.  The tension of the last twenty-four hours had given way, and Hilary knew her strength was gone.  Yet the advertisement ought to be taken to the Times office that very night, in order to be inserted without fail on Monday morning.

There was but one person whom she could trust—­Elizabeth.

She looked at the girl, who was kneeling beside the sofa, rubbing her feet, and sometimes casting a glance round, in the quiet way of one well used to nursing, who can find out how the sufferer is without “fussing” with questions.  She noticed, probably because she had seen little of her of late, a curious change in Elizabeth.  It must have been gradual, but yet its result had never been so apparent before.  Her brusqueness had softened down, and there had come into her and shone out of her, spite of all her natural uncomeliness of person, that beautiful, intangible something, common alike to peasant and queen, as clear to see and as sad to miss in both—­womanliness.  Added thereto was the gentle composure of mein which almost invariably accompanied it, which instinctively makes you fell that in great things or small, whatever the woman has to do, she will do it in the womanliest, wisest, and best way.

So thought Miss Hilary as she lay watching her servant, and then explained to her the errand upon which she wished to send her.

Not much explanation, for she merely gave her the advertisement to read, and told her what she wished done with it.  And Elizabeth, on her part, asked no questions, but simply listened and obeyed.

After she was gone Hilary lay on the sofa, passive and motionless.  Her strength and activity seemed to have collapsed at once into that heavy quietness which comes when one has endured to the utmost limit of endurance when one feels as if to speak a word or to lift a finger would be as much as life was worth.

“Oh, if I could only go to sleep!” was all she thought.