was a sort of
distant connection of the Selwoods, whose acquaintance she had made
during their last visit to England. They had been immensely taken with
her, and now she was fulfilling a long-standing invitation to visit them
in their South African home.

But with all her dazzling beauty and winning arts some men would not
have looked twice at Violet Avory when Marian Selwood was by. The fair
sweet face of the latter, with its large sleepy eyes, its red, smiling
lips, parting from a row of white regular teeth, could grow very lovely;
indeed, it was one of those faces which gain upon the observer with its
owner's further acquaintance. Nor was its normal gravity other than on
the surface, for to cause the great blue eyes to sparkle with fun and
mischief was no difficult matter. And Marian's disposition was as sweet
as her face, her mind that of a refined gentlewoman. She was born in
the colony, and had lived the greater part of her life where we now see
her, helping to keep house for her brother and his wife.

"Hot or cool, I vote we stroll somewhere," cried Violet, starting up
from her chair with a restlessness and energy she seldom displayed at
that time of the day, when the sun made himself very definitely felt,
even at that elevation.

"Very well," acquiesced the other, gathering up her work. Then she
added, with a smile, "You had better get a sunshade, Violet, or you'll
be taking back quite a stock of freckles. The now disconsolate ones
will all cry off then."

"Will they! But--are you not going to take one?"

"No. I'm about burnt enough already. Besides, there are no
disconsolate ones in my case to doom to disillusion, so it doesn't
matter."

"Oh yes! Very likely! I'm sure to believe that."

"Go away, and get your hat on," interrupted Marian.

"Come now, Marian," said Violet, as the two girls wandered down the
shady walk under the fruit-trees. "It's all very well for you to affect
the solemn, and all that kind of thing; but I don't believe in it a bit,
let me tell you. No--not one bit."

"Oh, don't you?"

"No, I don't. I believe, for all that quiet way of yours, you are just
as dangerous as they pretend I am. You're deep; that's what you are.
Now, there's that nice Mr Fanning. You flirted with him shockingly.
You know you did!"

"I wasn't aware of it," was the calm response. And then came a pause.
It was finally broken by Marian.

"Poor Renshaw! He and I were--well, not exactly chi