She looked long and wistfully at Willie's face, as he watched the
motion of the ducks in the great stable-pool. He laughed softly to
himself every now and then.

"Willie likes to see the ducks go overhead," said Susan,
instinctively adopting the form of speech she would have used to a
young child.

"Willie, boo! Willie, boo!" he replied, clapping his hands, and
avoiding her eye.

"Speak properly, Willie," said Susan, making a strong effort at self-
control, and trying to arrest his attention.

"You know who I am--tell me my name!" She grasped his arm almost
painfully tight to make him attend. Now he looked at her, and, for
an instant, a gleam of recognition quivered over his face; but the
exertion was evidently painful, and he began to cry at the vainness
of the effort to recall her name. He hid his face upon her shoulder
with the old affectionate trick of manner. She put him gently away,
and went into the house into her own little bedroom. She locked the
door, and did not reply at all to Michael's calls for her, hardly
spoke to old Peggy, who tried to tempt her out to receive some homely
sympathy, and through the open easement there still came the idiotic
sound of "Willie, boo! Willie, boo!"



CHAPTER III.