ught, he went away; but Amabel padded after him, bowl
in hand.

"Jeff," said she, "you must let me say how glad I am you and Weedon are
really seeing things from the same point of view."

"Don't make any mistake about that," said Jeff. "He's trying to bust
Addington, and Tin trying to save it. And to do that I've got to bust
Weedie himself."

He went home then and put his case to Lydia, and asked her why, if Miss
Amabel was so willing to teach the alien boy to read and teach the alien
girl to sew, she should be so cold to his pedagogical ambitions. Lydia
was curiously irresponsive, but at dusk she slipped away to Madame
Beattie's. To Lydia, what used to be Esther's house had now become
simply Madame Beattie's. She had her own shy way of getting in, so that
she need not come on Esther nor trouble the decorous maid. Perhaps Lydia
was a little afraid of Sophy, who spoke so smoothly and looked such
cool hostility. So she tapped at the kitchen door and a large cook of
sound principles who loved neither Esther nor Sophy, let her in and
passed her up the back stairs. Esther had strangely never noted this
adventurous way of entering. She was rather unobservant about some
things, and she would never have suspected a lady born of coming in by
the kitchen for any reason whatever. Esther, too, had some of the
Addington traditions ingrain.

Madame Beattie was in bed, where she usually was when not in mischief,
the summer breeze touching her toupee as tenderly as it might a young
girl's flossy crown. She always had a cool drink by her, and she was
always reading. Sometimes she put out her little ringed hand and moved
the glass to hear the clink of ice, and she did it now as Lydia came in.
Lydia liked the clink. It sounded festive to her. That was the word she
had for all the irresponsible exuberance Madame Beattie presented her
with, of boundless areas where you could be gay. Madame Beattie shut her
book and motioned to the door. But Lydia was already closing it. That
was the first thing when they had their gossips. Lydia came then and
perched on the foot of the bed. Her promotion from chair to bed marked
the progress of their intimacy.

"Madame Beattie," said she, "I wish you and I could go abroad together."

Madame Beattie grinned at her, with a perfect appreciation.

"You wouldn't like it," said she.

"I should like it," said Lydia. Yet she knew she did not want to go
abroad. This was only an expression of her pleasure in