ucester! He behaved like, like
they do, you know--at the end. It's absurd, at the very first meeting.
He couldn't possibly--_care_! I don't want to meet him again."

"You didn't like him, then?"

"Oh, yes, I did. Dreadfully. That's just why--"

"Enigma! Will you graciously explain?"

"Edith!" said Jean, in a low voice, almost a whisper. It seemed
treacherous to speak of Edith's secret, but Vanna was as another self,
to whom so far every thought had been confessed, and she was the most
loyal of confidantes. Besides, if Robert Gloucester were to be
successfully avoided, Vanna's co-operation would be needed.

"I am sure Edith cares for him, and if she does, she has had such a
long, long wait. Imagine how it would feel, to love a man with those
eyes, and wait alone at the other end of the world for six long years!
It would make me wretched to spoil Edith's happiness; but if he came
often, and looked at me like that, I--I should look back, Vanna, I know
I should. I might make all the resolutions in the world, but they
wouldn't last. I'm a born flirt. It's shocking, but it's true;
therefore you perceive there's only one thing for it--to avoid
temptation. You must go alone to-night, and say that I'm ill."

"Which would bring Edith round post-haste to-morrow morning, accompanied
by her guest. You must think of a better excuse than that if you really
wish to avoid him, my dear," replied Vanna derisively.

There was no contradicting this statement, for Jean was one of those
rare and blessed mortals who did not know the meaning of illness. As a
child she had romped gaily through the list of juvenile ailments,
thereafter for a dozen years she had bloomed in radiant flower-like
health, without a single day's illness, or a nearer approach to pain
than a headache whose reality had to be diagnosed in the novel manner
already described. To announce herself too unwell to keep a social
engagement would indeed arouse alarmed attention. She mused in silence
for several moments then said slowly:

"Yes! quite true! I should have to stay in bed, and that would be too
boring. I couldn't immolate myself to that extent even for Edith.
Vanna, what do you say to running off to the country to-morrow--you and
I? Miggles is there already, getting ready the house. Theoretically
she would chaperone us, practically we would bully her, and make her do
whatever we liked. You are not keen on festivities just now, and the
seaso