fire-place, such as her husband had put in at the restoration
throughout the house.

"Your Eminence, can you reassure us?" she said, smiling.

The Cardinal, too, smiled as he turned in his chair.

"I am confident the Bill will pass," he said. "But I do not know
yet what the price will be."

"Your Eminence means in England? Or elsewhere?" asked the
chaplain abruptly.

"In England and elsewhere, father."

Old Lady Jane Morpeth appeared at this moment, and the two
ladies sat down on the high oak settle that screened the fire
from the window. They showed no signs of anxiety; but Monsignor
perceived that their return at all to this room just now was
significant. Simultaneously the young man came in again, closing
the door behind him.

"Our enquiries are not answered," he said sharply. "We are trying
to get into touch with another office."

No one spoke for a minute. Even to Monsignor, who still found it
hard always to understand the communication-system of the time,
it was obvious that something must have happened. He knew that
Southminster Castle had been put into wireless touch with the
great Marconi office in Parliament Square, and that a failure to