ld say nothing. The report
of the little boy was good; he smiled at his father, and Ashe felt a
cooling balm in the touch of his soft hands and lips. He descended--in a
more philosophical mind; inclined, at any rate, to "damn" Lord Parham.
What a fool the man must be! Why couldn't he have taken it with a laugh,
and so turned the tables on Kitty?

Was there any good to be got out of apologizing? Ashe supposed he must
attempt it some time that night. A precious awkward business! But
relations had got to be restored somehow.

Lady Tranmore overtook him on the way down-stairs. In the press of the
afternoon they had hardly seen each other.

"What is really wrong with Lord Parham, William?" she asked him,
anxiously. Ashe hesitated, then whispered a word or two in her ear,
begging her to keep the great man in play for the evening. He was to
take her in, while Kitty would fall to the Bishop of the diocese.

"She gets on perfectly with the clergy," said Lady Tranmore, with an
involuntary sigh. Then, as the sense of humor was strong in both, they
laughed. But it was a chilly and perfunctory laughter.

They had no sooner passed into the main hall than Kitty came running
down-stairs, with a large packet in her hand.

"Mr. Darrell!"

"At your service!" said Darrell, emerging from the shadows of one of the
broad corridors of the ground-floor.

"Take it, please!" said Kitty, panting a little, as she gave the packet
into his hands. "If I look at it any more, I <i>might</i> burn it!"

"Suppose you do!"

"No, no!" said Kitty, pushing the bundle away, as he laughingly tendered
it. "I must see what happens!"

"Is the gap filled?"

She laid her finger on her lips. Her eyes danced. Then she hurried on to
the drawing-room.

Whether it were the soothing presence of the clergy or no, certainly
Kitty was no less triumphant at dinner than she had been in the
afternoon. The chorus of fun and pleasure that surrounded her, while he
himself sat, tired and bored, between Lady Edith Manley and Lady
Tranmore, did but make her offence the greater in the eyes of Lord
Parham. He had so far buried it in a complete and magnificent silence.
The meeting between him and his hostess before dinner had been marked by
a strict conformity to all the rules. Kitty had inquired after his
headache; Lord Parham expressed his regrets that he had missed so
brilliant a party; and Kitty, flirting her fan, invented messages from
the Royalties which, as most o