er
here," he answered. And they went into the house.

In descending the staircase on his way to the drawing-room before
dinner, Sir Nigel glanced about him with interested curiosity. If
the village had been put in order, something more had been done here.
Remembering the worn rugs and the bald-headed tiger, he lifted his
brows. To leave one's house in a state of resigned dilapidation and
return to find it filled with all such things as comfort combined with
excellent taste might demand, was an enlivening experience--or would
have been so under some circumstances. As matters stood, perhaps, he
might have felt better pleased if things had been less well done. But
they were very well done. They had managed to put themselves in the
right in this also. The rich sobriety of colour and form left no opening
for supercilious comment--which was a neat weapon it was annoying to be
robbed of.

The drawing-room was fresh, brightly charming, and full of flowers.
Betty was standing before an open window with her sister. His wife's
shoulders, he observed at once, had absolutely begun to suggest
contours. At all events, her bones no longer stuck out. But one did
not look at one's wife's shoulders when one could turn from them to a
fairness of velvet and ivory. "You know," he said, approaching them, "I
find all this very amazing. I have been looking out of my window on to
the gardens."

"It is Betty who has done it all," said Rosy.

"I did not suspect you of doing it, my dear Rosalie," smiling. "When I
saw Betty standing in the avenue, I knew at once that it was she who had
mended the chimney-pots in the village and rehung the gates."

For the present, at least, it was evident that he meant to be
sufficiently amiable. At the dinner table he was conversational and
asked many questions, professing a natural interest in what had been
done. It was not difficult to talk to a girl whose eyes and shoulders
combined themselves with a quick wit and a power to attract which he
reluctantly owned he had never seen equalled. His reluctance arose
from the fact that such a power complicated matters. He must be on
the defensive until he knew what she was going to do, what he must do
himself, and what results were probable or possible. He had spent his
life in intrigue of one order or another. He enjoyed outwitting people
and rather preferred to attain an end by devious paths. He began every
acquaintance on the defensive. His argument was that you