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particular hurry, after all these years. How surprised they will all be! and how cross. I wonder how he will get identified. He didn’t seem bothered about that, but I know Aunt Sophia will make things as difficult as possible. . . . But they won’t go on being horrid to him—that would be no use, once they are sure that he is Lord Trent. . . . And by and by I shall go back. I wonder what I shall do then? I suppose Aunt Sophia will want me to live with her, but that will be very different from having her to live with me. I think I would rather go and earn some money, if there was only something I could do. . . . I don’t think he need expect me to come to Trent Stoke very much. Perhaps presently it will hurt less, and then I shall be glad to go. But not for a long time yet. Oh, it will be horrible if he doesn’t love it as I do! He must—but he’s so queer about lots of things . . . but much nicer now than he ever was in London.”

She had a letter from him from Honolulu. It was a nice letter, Pamela thought, but she wondered—dear innocent!—why he did not travel as a passenger. It was a much nicer letter than most of her English ones.

“I hope you are not letting yourself be trampled on. I am working in the engine-room here—third engineer, which is quite an advance, and there isn’t any news to tell you. Please don’t forget to write. . . . I hope you are getting on all right, it is beastly lonely sometimes, isn’t it? You will probably think it cheek of me, but I want you to think now and again when things get that black empty feeling (no, you didn’t say anything about it, but—) ‘Tony, my cousin, he knows, and two lonely people are better than one, even if they aren’t together.’ I have never told anyone but you that I minded being alone, though I suppose Alison Straine knows. She knows most things. . . . Do, for God’s sake, take care of yourself. I like you more than