"My bairn!" cried the astounded Corp.

"Yours," said Tommy, reproachfully; "and he has done for us. Ladies
and gentlemen, the game is up."

Yes, the game was up, and she was glad, Grizel said to herself, as
they made their melancholy pilgrimage of what had once been an
enchanted land. But she felt that Tommy had been very forbearing to
her, and that she did not deserve it. Undoubtedly he had ordered her
about, but in so doing had he not been making half-pathetic sport of
his old self--and was it with him that she was annoyed for ordering,
or with herself for obeying? And why should she not obey, when it was
all a jest? It was as if she still had some lingering fear of Tommy.
Oh, she was ashamed of herself. She must say something nice to him at
once. About what? About his book, of course. How base of her not to
have done so already! but how good of him to have overlooked her
silence on that great topic!

It was not ignorance of its contents that had kept her silent. To
confess the horrid truth, Grizel had read the book suspiciously,
looking as through a microscope for something wrong--hoping not to
find it, but peering minutely. The book, she knew, was beautiful; but
it was the writer of the book she was peering for--the Tommy she had
known so well, what had he grown into? In her heart she had exulted
from the first in his success, and she should have been still more
glad (should she not?) to learn that his subject was woman; but no,
that had irritated her. What was perhaps even worse, she had been
still more irritated on hearing that the work was rich in sublime
thoughts. As a boy, he had maddened her most in his grandest moments.