hat the air of home might be
more complete for them. _Vis-a-vis_ they had eaten together and
laughed together and talked together till it grew later and later, and
the motor waited without in the yard amongst the ravens and the ducks
who peered from the straw of their winter quarters at the big awkward
machine.

"Jimmy" ... she had started when the crumbs and dishes had been cleared
away, and for some seconds did not follow up his name with any other
word. It was always Bulstrode who took wonderful care of the time. It
was he who gave her her hat, its pins, her coat, her furs, her gloves,
one by one, her muff last, his eyes on her, as each article slowly went
to place, until her big white veil wound and wound and pinned and
fastened and hid her. "Jimmy," she whispered, as he ruthlessly and
definitely opened the door and the cold rushed in, "let's build _here_."

Still it was she who took all the blame of their tardy departure from
the homely hospitality of the inn; she assured him that she could make
a wonderful toilet and in an incredibly short time, and that for once
she wouldn't be late for dinner at the castle.

"Not," Bulstrode assured her, "that it in the least matters, but the
Duke, as likely as not, would choose to dine alone; he was a man of
moods."

"In which case," she had stopped with her foot on the auto step,
"Penhaven isn't a bad place for tea, and why wouldn't dinner at this
perfect inn...."

But Bulstrode met her words with a shake of his head and a shrug of his
shoulders, and helped her firmly into the motor and sat again by her
side.

"I can't tell you," he said, "what will be going on at the castle. I
haven't been back since I left it two days ago, and almost anything can
have happened in that time. The Duchess of Westboro' herself, in the
interval, may have gone back to her husband."

"Heavens!" Mrs. Falconer exclaimed, "in which case how horribly _de
trop_ we shall be."

But Bulstrode consoled her with the thought that if they were _de trop_
they would at least be _de trop ensemble_.

Amongst the handful of letters waiting for her in her dressing-room at
the castle there had been a despatch from America. Even this, and a
hasty look at her mail had not succeeded in holding her attention or
even carrying it beyond the house. Her husband had expected to land in
Liverpool at the end of the coming week; he was to take her home with
him. And until he arrived she was breathing, as s