Early in the autumn Maggie had a little note from Mr.
Magnus. It said:
"You have not written to any of us for months. Won't you come just
for a night to see your aunts? At least let us know that you are
happy."
She cried that night in bed, squeezing her head into the pillow so
that no one should hear her. She seemed to have lost all her pluck.
She must do something, but what? She did not know how to deal with
people. If they were kind and friendly there were so many things
that she could do, but this silent creeping away from her paralysed
her. She remembered how she had said to Katherine: "No one can make
me unhappy if I do not wish it to be." Now she did not dare to think
how unhappy she was. She knew that they all thought her strange and
odd, and she felt that strangeness creeping upon her. She MUST be
odd if many people thought her so. She became terribly self-
conscious, wondering whether her words and movements were strange.
She was often so tired that she could not drag one foot after
another.
A few weeks before Christmas something happened. A terrible thing,
perhaps--but she was delivered by it .
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