But next day she seemed to get an inkling of what the worry was.  Mr Thornycroft, when they were alone together, begged her to tell him if she had any money difficulties—­debts, she supposed—­and to be frank with him for old times’ and her father’s sake.

“What! are you bothering your mind about that?” she gently scolded him.  “I assure you I am all right.  I haven’t any difficulties—­or hardly any—­not now.  I have no rent, you see.”

“They don’t charge you anything where you board?” “No.  Redford never has charged folks for board.  Seriously,” she hastened to add, in earnest tones, “I have all I want.  And if I try presently to earn more, it will be because I think everybody ought to earn his living or hers.  You earned yours.  I despise people who just batten on the earnings of others, and never do a hand’s turn for themselves.”

“Batten!” he murmured ironically, with a troubled smile.  “You look as if you had been battening, don’t you?  Debbie, I’m a business man, and I know you can’t get behindhand in money matters and pull up again just when you want to; you can’t get straight merely by anticipating income, when there’s nothing extra coming in.  Tell me, if you don’t mind, how you managed?” She flushed, and her eyes dropped; then she faced him honestly.

“I will tell you,” she declared.  “I’ve wanted to confess it, though I’m horribly ashamed to—­and I’m afraid you’ll think I did not value it.  I did indeed—­I hated to part with it; but I was so hard up, and I didn’t know which way to turn, or what else to do—­”

“And never came to me!”

“Well, I did—­in a way.  I—­I sold your pearls.”

“That’s right, Debbie.  That’s a load off my mind.  It is the best thing you could have done with them.”

“No, indeed!  I have regretted it ever since.”

“How much did they give you?” “A tremendous lot—­three hundred and fifty guineas.”

“The swindlers!  They were worth two thousand.”

“What!” She was thunderstruck.  “You gave me a necklace worth two thousand guineas?”

“I only wish you’d let me give you a score or two at the same price, on condition that you sold them for three-fifty whenever you needed a little cash.”

She was quite upset by this remark, and what had given rise to it.  Impulsively—­too impulsively, considering how weak he was—­she kissed his damp forehead, and rushed weeping from his sight.

In the hot evening, while the trained nurse had her tea at grateful leisure in the housekeeper’s room, Deb again took that nurse’s place.  She sat by the pillow of the patient, leaning against it, holding his hand in hers.  Only the sound of the cruel north wind and his more cruel breathing disturbed the stillness that enveloped them.  She hoped he was sleeping, until he spoke suddenly in a way that showed him only too wide awake.

“Debbie,” he said, “if I was quite sure I would not get well this time, I should put that question to you again.”