chasing into cover the squirrels and rabbits she had tried to tame. Symbolic of him, she thought, in one of those waves of antagonism which would ride close upon the waves of her love.
"No more," she exclaimed, at last. "I'm afraid to think how it will all look when the sun comes out."
"Much better," he assured her. He stopped and lighted a cigarette. His expression became one of gravity. "I must tell you the real reason why the uncles and aunt have not been to see you. You're sure Rags has said nothing to Eden?"
"Nothing." She was startled. She feared some strange development of the situation.
He went on. "We've been worried"—he knitted his brow and inhaled the smoke deeply—"about my grandmother."
His grandmother! Always that imposing, sinister, deplorable old figurehead of the Jalna battleship!
"Yes? Is she not so well?"
He returned, irritably: "She's quite well. Perfectly well. But—she's given us all a bad fright, and now she's behaving in—well, a very worrying fashion. I thought Eden had better not be told."
Alayne stared, mystified beyond words.
"Pretended she was dying. Staged a regular deathbed scene. Good-byes and all. It was awful. You couldn't believe how well she did it."
Alayne could believe anything of old Adeline.
"Tell me about it."
"Don't repeat any of this to Eden."
"Certainly I will not."
"It gave us a terrible fright. I had come in rather late. About one o'clock, I think. I had just put on the light in my bedroom. Wakefield was awake. He said he couldn't sleep because moonlight was coming into the room and the cupboard door stood ajar. It worried him. He wanted me to look into the cupboard, to make sure there was nothing there. I did, to please him. Just as I stuck my head into it a loud rapping came from below. Gran beating on the floor with her stick. The kid
