r Timothy begged. "She's had a wretched
time."

Francis smiled confidently.

"I'm going to make up for it, sir," he promised. "And this South
American trip," he continued, as they turned towards the French windows,
"you'll call that off?"

Sir Timothy hesitated.

"I am not quite sure."

When they reached the garden, Lady Cynthia was alone. She scarcely
glanced at Francis. Her eyes were anxiously fixed upon his companion.

"Margaret has gone in to make the cocktails herself," she explained.
"We have both sworn off absinthe for the rest of our lives, and we know
Hedges can't be trusted to make one without."

"I'll go and help her," Francis declared.

Lady Cynthia passed her arm through Sir Timothy's.

"I want to know about South America," she begged. "The sight of those
trunks worries me."

Sir Timothy's casual reply was obviously a subterfuge. They crossed the
lawn and the rustic bridge, almost in silence, passing underneath the
pergola of roses to the sheltered garden at the further end. Then Lady
Cynthia paused.

"You are not going to South America," she pleaded, "alone?"

Sir Timothy took her hands.

"My dear," he said, "listen, please, to my confession. I am a fraud.
I am not a purveyor of new sensations for a decadent troop of weary,
fashionable people. I am a fraud sometimes even to myself. I have had
good luck in material things. I have had bad luck in the precious,
the sentimental side of life. It has made something of an artificial
character of me, on the surface at any rate. I am really a simple,
elderly man who loves fresh air, clean, honest things, games, and a
healthy life. I have no ambitions except those connected with sport. I
don't even want to climb to the topmost niches in the world of finance.
I think you have looked at me through the wrong-coloured spectacles. You
have had a whimsical fancy for a character which does not exist."

"What I have seen," Lady Cynthia answered, "I have seen through no
spectacles at all--with my own eyes. But what I have seen, even, does
not count. There is something else."

"I am within a few weeks of my fiftieth birthday," Sir Timothy reminded
her, "and you, I believe, are twenty-nine."

"My dear man," Lady Cynthia assured him fervently, "you are the only
person in the world who can keep me from feeling forty-nine."

"And your people--"

"Heavens! My people, for the first time in their lives, will count me a
brilliant success," Lady Cynthia declare