her arm. "Go and enquire."

For a moment Snagsby surveyed the invasion with horror and then fled
precipitately into the recesses of the house.

"Of _course_ they're at home!" said Lady Beach-Mandarin. "Fancy
that--that--that _navigable_--trying to shut the door on us!"

For a moment the two brightly excited ladies surveyed each other and
then Lady Beach-Mandarin, with a quickness of movement wonderful in one
so abundant, began to open first one and then another of the various
doors that opened into the long hall-living room. At a peculiar little
cry from Miss Garradice she turned from a contemplation of the long low
study in which so much of the Euphemia books had been written, to
discover Sir Isaac behind her, closely followed by an agonized Snagsby.

"A-a-a-a-h!" she cried, with both hands extended, "and so you've come
in, Sir Isaac! That's perfectly delightful. This is my friend Miss
Garradice, who's _dying_ to see anything you've left of poor Euphemia's
garden. And _how_ is dear Lady Harman?"

For some crucial moments Sir Isaac was unable to speak and regarded his
visitors with an expression that was unpretendingly criminal.

Then he found speech. "You can't," he said. "It--can't be managed." He
shook his head; his lips were whitely compressed.

"But all the way from London, Sir Isaac!"

"Lady Harman's ill," lied Sir Isaac. "She mustn't be disturbed.
Everything has to be kept quiet. See? Not even shouting. Not even
ordinarily raised voices. A voice like yours--might kill her. That's why
Snagsby here said we were not at home. We aren't at home--not to
anyone."

Lady Beach-Mandarin was baffled.

"Snagsby," said Sir Isaac, "open that door."

"But can't I see her--just for a moment?"

Sir Isaac's malignity had softened a little at the prospect of victory.
"Absolutely impossible," he said. "Everything disturbs her, every tiny
thing. You----You'd be certain to."

Lady Beach-Mandarin looked at her companion and it was manifest that she
was at the end of her resources. Miss Garradice after the fashion of
highly strung spinsters suddenly felt disappointed in her leader. It
wasn't, her silence intimated, for her to offer suggestions.

The ladies were defeated. When at last that stiff interval ended their
dresses rustled doorward, and Sir Isaac broke out into the civilities of
a victor....

It was only when they were a mile away from Black Strand that fluent
speech returned to Lady Beach-Mandarin. "The little