nd said he knew a spot where a nightingale had been in
the habit of singing long ago, when his explorations of the Thames
River had preceded those of the Fly River. He found three persons who
expressed their willingness to accept his guidance on the spot, if it
were not too far away. One of these was Phyllis, the other two were
notorious lovers. Off they started without hats or caps.

This Ella heard when she returned to the garden, whence she had been
called away for ten minutes to interview a man who had an electric
launch for sale.

The news, communicated to her by her husband in answer to her inquiry,
had surprised her. That was why she had given a little laugh with a tone
of derision in it when she had said:

"A nightingale! How lovely! I hope they may find it. It shouldn't
prove so arduous as the quest of the meteor-bird. I do hope that those
children will not catch cold. It is a trifle imprudent."

"Imprudent?"

"Going off that way with nothing on their heads."

"Or in them. Happy children!" cried a moralizing novelist, who
was smoking an extremely good cigar--it had not come from his own
tobacconist.

"We can't all be novel-writers," said one of the women.

"Thank the Lord!" said one of the men, with genuine piety.

In three-quarters of an hour the members of the quest party returned.
They had been fully rewarded for their trouble; they had been listening
to the nightingale for nearly twenty minutes, they said; it had been
very lovely, they agreed, without a single dissentient voice. It
probably was; at any rate they were very silent for the rest of the
night.

"You have begun well," said Ella to Herbert, when they found themselves
together in the drawing room, later on, shortly before midnight. Someone
was playing on the piano, so that the general conversation and yawning
were not interfered with. "You have begun well. You will soon get to
know her if your others days here are like to-day. That nightingale! Oh,
yes, you will soon get to know her."

He shook his head.

"I doubt it," said he, in a low tone. His eyes were turned in the
direction of Phyllis. She was on a seat at an open window, the twilight
of moonlight and lamplight glimmering about her hair. "I doubt it. It
takes a man such as I am a long time to know such a girl as Phyllis
Ayrton."

That was a saying which had a certain amount of irritation for Ella. He
had never said anything in the past about her, Ella, being beyond the
knowl