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all nonsense about the nuns, and meditating on the advisability of going in pursuit of Mr. Brant to tell him so. He dreaded the prospect of a long succession of days alone between George and George's mother.

Mrs. Brant spoke again. "I was sorry to find that the Sisters have been kept on here. Are they much with George?"

"The Sisters? I don't know. The upper nurses are Red Cross, as you saw. But of course the others are about a good deal. What's wrong? They seem to me perfect."

She hesitated and coloured a little. "I don't want them to find out—about the Extreme Unction," she finally said.

Campton repeated her words blankly. He began to think that anxiety and fatigue had confused her mind.

She coloured more deeply. "Oh, I forgot—you don't know. I couldn't think of anything but George at first . . . and the whole thing is so painful to me. . . Where's my bag?"

She groped for her reticule, found it in the folds of the cloak she had kept about her shoulders, and fumbled in it with wrinkled jewelled fingers.

"Anderson hasn't spoken to you, then—spoken about Mrs. Talkett?" she asked suddenly.

"About Mrs. Talkett? Why should he? What on earth has happened?"

"Oh, I wouldn't see her myself . . . I couldn't. . .