ew
very little herself, but was supposed to know a great deal because she
wore a kind of cap). She had a pretty, delicate, kind face, and was
wearing large wash-leather gloves, in case she should wish to do a
little gardening later on.

Daphne had still much of the child in her, and there was nothing she
enjoyed quite so much as gardening with Mrs. Foster, and occasionally
stopping to eat a gingerbread-nut, and hear something about Cyril and
the brilliant remarks he had made as a child.

Mrs. Foster had a chiffonnier of a kind Daphne had never seen before,
which fascinated her because such queer delightful things came out of it
in the middle of the morning--slices of seed cake, apples, and the
gingerbread-nuts. There were pink shavings in the fireplace, and
wherever there was not a photograph of Cyril there was one of the Prince
Imperial. Evidently he had been the passion of Mrs. Foster's earlier
life. She loved to tell the story of how she had seen him at
Chislehurst, and how she thought he had looked at her.

There were other nice things in the cottage: there were two rather large
vases of pink china on which were reproduced photographs of Cyril's
great-uncle and great-aunt--one in whiskers, the other in parted but
raised hair with an Alexandra curl on the left shoulder. In these vases
folded slips of paper called spills were kept. A modern note was struck
by the presence of a baby Grand--a jolly, clumsy, disproportioned
youthful piano, rather like a colt, on which Daphne played Chopin to
Mrs. Foster, and sometimes The Chocolate Soldier to Cyril; and Mrs.
Foster, at twilight, sometimes played and even sang, "_I cannot sing
the old songs, they are too dear to me,_" which her mother used to sing,
or, coming a little nearer to the present, "_Ask nothing more, nothing
more, all I can give thee, I give,_" a passionate song of the early
eighties.

No one, except Daphne, ever did ask any more.

The whole thing was, to Daphne, a treat. Something in the atmosphere of
Ladysmith Cottage--that was its name--fascinated and amused her.

Mrs. Foster was a widow. Her husband had been a distinguished soldier.
Almost the whole of her extremely small income had been devoted to
Cyril's education, and with the assistance of an uncle who took interest
in him, he had been got into the Guards, where he existed happily with a
comparatively small allowance.

Mrs. Foster had not been at all surprised or annoyed at his wishing to
marry