sh our walk. We'll talk about
something else if you like."

She drew a little sigh of relief.

"You are a dear, Maurice," she repeated. "Come along, we'll go down
the lane and over the hills home. I do feel safe, somehow, with you,"
she added, impulsively. "You are not going away just yet, are you?"

"Not for a fortnight, at any rate," he answered.

"And you won't leave me alone?" she begged--"not even if I ask to be
left alone? You see--I can't make you understand--but I don't even
trust myself."

He laughed reassuringly.

"I'll look after you, never fear," he answered. "I'll be better than a
watchdog. Tell me, what's your handicap at golf now? We must have a
game to-morrow."

They walked down the lane, talking--in a somewhat subdued manner,
perhaps, but easily enough--upon lighter subjects. And then at the
corner, just as they had passed the entrance to Blackbird's Nest, they
came face to face with Saton. Vandermere felt her suddenly creep
closer to him, as though for protection, and from his six feet odd of
height, he frowned angrily at the young man with his hat in his hand
preparing to accost them. Never was dislike more instinctive and
hearty. Vandermere, an ordinarily intelligent but unimaginative
Englishman, of the normally healthy type, a sportsman, a good fellow,
and a man of breeding--and Saton, this strange product of strange
circumstances, externally passable enough, but with something about
him which seemed, even in that clear November sunshine, to suggest the
footlights.

"You are quite a stranger, Miss Champneyes," Saton said, taking her
unresisting hand in his. "I hope that you are going in to see the
Comtesse. Only this morning she told me that she was finding it
appallingly lonely."

"I--I wasn't calling anywhere this afternoon," Lois said timidly.
"Captain Vandermere has come down to stay with us for a few days, and
I was showing him the country. This is Mr. Saton--Captain Vandermere.
I don't know whether you remember him."

The two men exchanged the briefest of greetings. Saton's was civil
enough. Vandermere's was morose, almost discourteous.

"Let me persuade you to change your mind," Saton said, speaking
slowly, and with his eyes fixed upon Lois. "The Comtesse would be so
disappointed if she knew that you had passed this way and had not
entered."

Vandermere was conscious that in some way the girl by his side was
changed. She drew a little away from him.

"Very well," she said,