and reproached himself bitterly for not having disposed of them at the
same time as their mother. Now he would have to go through another
period of mourning and the consequent delay in pressing his suit.
Moreover, he would have to allow a decent interval between his
conversation with Miss Lindsay and their untimely end.

The news of the catastrophe arrived two or three days before the return
of the girl from her summer holidays. She learnt it in the first half-
hour from her landlady, and sat in a dazed condition listening to a
description of the grief-stricken father and the sympathy extended to him
by his fellow-citizens. It appeared that nothing had passed his lips for
two days.

[Illustration: SHE LEARNT THE NEWS IN THE FIRST HALF-HOER FROM HER
LANDLADY.]

"Shocking!" said Miss Lindsay, briefly. "Shocking !"

An instinctive feeling that the right and proper thing to do was to nurse
his grief in solitude kept Mr. Barrett out of her way for nearly a week.
When she did meet him she received a limp handshake and a greeting in a
voice from which all hope seemed to have departed.

"I am very sorry," she said, with a sort of measured gentleness.

Mr. Barrett, in his hushed voice, thanked her.

"I am all alone now," he said, pathetically. "There is nobody now to
care whether I live or die."