mn.

She suddenly came to the conclusion one day that her husband was
not looking well--a conclusion which was certainly well founded. She
declared that a few days up the river was precisely what would restore
him to robust health. (But here it is to be feared her judgment was in
error.) He had been thinking too much about the new development of the
mine and the property surrounding it at Taragonda Creek. What did his
receiving a couple of hundred thousand pounds matter if his health were
jeopardized, she inquired of him one day, wearing the anxious face of
the Good Wife.

He had smiled that curious smile of his,--it was becoming more curious
every day,--and had said:

"What, indeed!"

"Up the river we shall go, and I'll get Phyllis to come with us to amuse
you--you know that you like Phyllis," his wife cried.

"There is no one I like better than Phyllis," he had said.

And so the matter had been settled.

But during the day or two that followed this settlement, Ella came
upon several of her friends who she found were looking a trifle fagged
through the pressure of the season, and she promptly invited them to The
Mooring, so that she had a party of close upon a dozen persons coming
to her house--some for a day, some for as long as three days, commencing
with the Tuesday when she and Phyllis went off together. Mr. Linton had
promised to join the party toward the end of the week.

And that was how it came about that Herbert Courtland found himself
daily admiring the cleverness of Phyllis Ayrton when she had the punt
pole in her hands. He also admired the gradual tinting of her fair face,
through the becoming exertion of taking the punt up the lovely backwater
or on to the placid reaches beyond. Sometimes the punt contained three
or four of the party in addition to Herbert, but twice he was alone with
her, and shared his admiration of her with no one.

CHAPTER XXXI.

YOU MAY TRUST MR. COURTLAND.

Mrs. Linton was greatly amused--she certainly was surprised. The
surprises were natural, but the amusement was not quite logical. It was,
however, quite natural that her guests--two of them excepted--should be
amused when they observed her surprise.

Could anything be funnier, one of these guests asked another in a
whisper, than Mrs. Linton's chagrin on finding that her own particular
Sir Lancelot had discovered an Elaine for himself?

Of course the guest who was so questioned agreed that nothing could
possibl