in a flash why the Home-Davises had had none
of it. The years in this Cromwell house had been too long.

"We've always imagined that Cousin Katherine must have been in love with
your father, Uncle Basil, before he married," said Elinor, when they
had reached the heavy stage of sweet pudding; "and when the will was
read, we were sure of it. For, of course, mother was just as nearly
related to her as uncle Basil was."

It was difficult for Mary to realize that this Aunt Sara could be a
sister of the handsome, dark-faced man with burning eyes whose features
had remained cameo-clear in her memory since childhood. But Mrs.
Home-Davis was the ugly duckling of a handsome and brilliant family, an
accident of fate which had embittered her youth, and indirectly her
daughter's.

"How shall I get away from them?" Mary asked herself, desperately, that
night. But fate was fighting for her in the form of a man she had never
seen, a man not even in London at the moment.

In a room below Mary's Elinor was asking Mrs. Home-Davis how they could
get rid of the convent cousin.

"She won't do," the young woman said.

"She reminds me of her mother," remarked Mrs. Home-Davis. "I thought she
would grow up like that."

"Yet there's a look in her eyes of Uncle Basil," Elinor amended,
brushing straight hair of a nondescript brown, which she admired because
it was long.

"With such a combination of qualities as she'll probably develop, she'd
much better have stayed in her convent," the elder woman went on.

"I wish to goodness she had," snapped Elinor.

"You are--er--thinking of Doctor Smythe, dear?"

"Ye-es--partly," the younger admitted, reluctantly; for there was
humiliation to her vanity in the admission. "Not that Arthur'd care for
that type of girl, particularly, or that he'd be disloyal to me--if he
were let alone. But you can see for yourself, mother--_is_ she the kind
that will let men alone? At dinner she made eyes even at the footman. I
was watching her."

"She can't have met any men, unless at that old Scotchwoman's house,"
replied Mrs. Home-Davis. "Perhaps even their Romish consciences would
have forced them to show her a few, before she took her vows--Catholic
young men, of course."

"Perhaps one of them decided her to break the vows."

"She hasn't really broken them, you know, Elinor. We must be just."

"Well, anyhow, she hasn't the air of an engaged person. And if she's
here when Arthur gets back to London, I feel