Laura drew me to the nearest seat, an ottoman in the middle of the room. “Look!” she said, “look here!”⁠—and pointed to the bosom of her dress.

I saw, for the first time, that the lost brooch was pinned in its place again. There was something real in the sight of it, something real in the touching of it afterwards, which seemed to steady the whirl and confusion in my thoughts, and to help me to compose myself.

“Where did you find your brooch?” The first words I could say to her were the words which put that trivial question at that important moment.

“ She found it, Marian.”

“Where?”

“On the floor of the boathouse. Oh, how shall I begin⁠—how shall I tell you about it! She talked to me so strangely⁠—she looked so fearfully ill⁠—she left me so suddenly!”