friends
since we were children, and I'm not going to hear you run her down. The
less you say the better."

He was taken aback at her words and manner, and stood, shifting uneasily
from one foot to the other and with his eyes moving restlessly from side
to side. He had made up his mind on his ride home that Ailleen had
ridden away in anger, and that the first thing she would wish for would
be an opportunity to abuse Nellie. It was quite inexplicable to him that
she should defend instead of attack her.

Ailleen looked at him steadily for a while, watching his confusion and
discomfiture, and feeling more and more angry with herself for having,
earlier in the day, allowed his words to have even a passing effect upon
her.

"Look here," she repeated, yielding to a sudden impulse which came upon
her to talk seriously to him, "I heard quite enough from Nellie to
understand. Are you going to tell your mother what you have done?"

She waited until he answered, in an indistinct mumble, that he did not
know.

"Very well, then, I do," she retorted. "If you don't, I shall."

"But I say----" he began, and hesitated. He had always had a certain
amount of fear for her when he was near her--a fear which changed into a
covetous admiration when he was away from her; but the present attitude
she adopted towards him accentuated that fear until he knew no other
sentiment.

"Well?" she said, as he stopped.

"It'll be all right," he said in a cringing tone. "You'll only make
things worse by interfering. It's not your business. If Nellie and I
like to have a quarrel, we can make it up our own way. We don't----"

"If you think you can make me believe a story like that, you are very
much mistaken," she interrupted quickly. "I heard quite enough----"

"You didn't hear everything," he interposed quickly; for an idea came to
him--if Mrs. Dickson had to hear the tale she should hear it from him,
with certain little embellishments and figurative allusions, which would
effectually destroy any chance Ailleen might have of making capital out
of the episode.

"I heard quite enough," she answered.

"No, you didn't," he retorted, growing desperate lest his mother,
hearing their voices, should suddenly come out on to the verandah and
learn what they were talking about before he had time to put his side of
the story to her. "If you had you would have known I tried and tried to
get Nellie to come in so that I could tell the old woman about it, o