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 sulking and ill-temper on the part of Miss Egan. The invincible nurse even quarreled with the cook, and was uncivil to Olivia, who thought, "What next is to happen? I shall be forced to look for a new nurse."

On the evening of the third day, just after dinner, Higgins opened the door and went in search of Olivia.

"The old gentleman is all right again," he said. "He's gone to bathe and he'd like to see you in the library in half an hour."

She found him there, seated by the big mahogany desk, bathed and spotlessly neat in clean linen; but he looked very old and weary, and beneath the tan of the leathery face there was a pallor which gave him a yellowish look. It was his habit never to refer in any way to these sad occasions, to behave always as if he had only been away for a day or two and wanted to hear what had happened during his absence.

Looking up at her, he said gravely, "I wanted to speak to you, Olivia. You weren't busy, were you? I didn't disturb you?"

"No," she said. "There's nothing. . . . Jean and Thérèse are here with Sybil. . . . That's all."

"Sybil," he repeated. "Sybil. . . . She's very happy these days, isn't she?" Olivia nodded and even smiled a little, in a warm, understanding way, so that he added, "Well, we mustn't spoil her happiness. We mustn't allow anything to happen to it."

A light came into the eyes of Olivia. "No; we mustn't," she repeated, and then, "She's a clever girl. . . . She knows what she wants from life, and that's the whole secret. Most people never know until it's too late."

A silence followed this speech, so eloquent, so full of unsaid things, that Olivia grew uneasy.

"I wanted to talk to you about . . ." he hesitated for a moment, and she saw that beneath the edge of the table his