nourable Mrs. Dennant, Miss Dennant, and
the Honourable Charlotte Penguin, a maiden aunt with insufficient lungs,
sat twice a day in their own atmosphere. A momentary weakness came on
Shelton the first time he saw them sitting there at lunch. What was it
gave them their look of strange detachment? Mrs. Dennant was bending
above a camera.

"I'm afraid, d' you know, it's under-exposed," she said.

"What a pity! The kitten was rather nice!" The maiden aunt, placing the
knitting of a red silk tie beside her plate, turned her aspiring,
well-bred gaze on Shelton.

"Look, Auntie," said Antonia in her clear, quick voice, "there's the
funny little man again!"

"Oh," said the maiden aunt--a smile revealed her upper teeth; she looked
for the funny little man (who was not English)--"he's rather nice!"

Shelton did not look for the funny little man; he stole a glance that
barely reached Antonia's brow, where her eyebrows took their tiny upward
slant at the outer corners, and her hair was still ruffled by a windy
walk. From that moment he became her slave.

"Mr. Shelton, do you know anything about these periscopic binoculars?"
said Mrs. Dennant's voice; "they're splendid for buildin's, but buildin's
are so disappointin'. The thing is to get human interest, isn't it?" and
her glance wandered absently past Shelton in search of human interest.

"You haven't put down what you've taken, mother."

From a little leather bag Mrs. Dennant took a little leather book.

"It's so easy to forget what they're about," she said, "that's so
annoyin'."

Shelton was not again visited by his uneasiness at their detachment; he
accepted them and all their works, for there was something quite sublime
about the way that they would leave the dining-room, unconscious that
they themselves were funny to all the people they had found so funny
while they had been sitting there, and he would follow them out
unnecessarily upright and feeling like a fool.

In the ensuing fortnight, chaperoned by the maiden aunt, for Mrs. Dennant
disliked driving, he sat opposite to Antonia during many drives; he
played sets of tennis with her; but it was in the evenings after
dinner--those long evenings on a parquet floor in wicker chairs dragged
as far as might be from the heating apparatus--that he seemed so very
near her. The community of isolation drew them closer. In place of a
companion he had assumed the part of friend, to whom she could confide
all her h