y, miss."

"But how could you be expecting me at all?"

"Miss Ingate come home yesterday. She said you couldn't be far off, miss."

"Not Miss ... _Mrs._--Moncreiff," said Audrey firmly.

"I beg your pardon, madam," Aguilar responded with absolute
imperturbability. "She never said nothing about that."

And he proceeded mechanically to the next window.

The yard-dog began to bark. Audrey, ignoring Musa, went round the shrubbery
towards the kennel. The chained dog continued to bark, furiously, until
Audrey was within six feet of him, and then he crouched and squirmed and
gave low whines and his tail wagged with extreme rapidity. Audrey bent
down, trembling.... She could scarcely see.... There was something about
the green film on the drive, about the look of the house, about the sheeted
drawing-room glimpsed through the open window, about the view of
Mozewater...! She felt acutely and painfully sorry for, and yet envious of,
the young girl in a plain blue frock who used to haunt the house and the
garden, and who had somehow made the house and the garden holy for evermore
by her unhappiness and her longings.... Audrey was crying.... She heard a
step and stood upright. It was Musa's step.

"I have never seen you so exquisite," said Musa in a murmur subdued and yet
enthusiastic. All his faculties seemed to be dwelling reflectively upon her
with passionate appreciation.

They had at last begun to talk, really--he in French, and she partly in
French and partly in English. It was her tears, or perhaps her gesture in
trying to master them, that had loosed their tongues. The ancient dog was
forgotten, and could not understand why. Audrey was excusably startled by
Musa's words and tone, and by the sudden change in his attitude. She
thought that his personal distinction at the moment was different from and
superior to any other in her experience. She had a comfortable feeling of
condescension towards Nick and towards Jane Foley. And at the same time she
blamed Musa, perceiving that as usual he was behaving like a child who
cannot grasp the great fact that life is very serious.

"Yes," she said. "That's all very fine, that is. You pretend this, that,
and the other. But why are you here? Why aren't you at work in Paris?
You've got the chance of a lifetime, and instead of staying at home and
practising hard and preparing yourself, you come gadding over to England
simply because there's a bit of money in your pocket!"

She wa