ould not have done more for Elspeth. Yet it was
not done to find her a husband, but quite the reverse, as we have
seen. On reflection Tommy must smile at what he has been doing, but
not while he is working the figures. The artist never smiles at
himself until afterwards.

And now he not only wondered at times how Elspeth and David were
getting on, but whether she noticed how he was getting on with Grizel;
for in matters relating to Tommy Elspeth was almost as sharp as he in
matters that related to her, and he knew it. When he proposed to
Elspeth that they should ask Gemmell to go fishing with them on the
morrow ("He has been overworked of late and it would do him good") he
wanted to add, in a careless voice, "We might invite Grizel also," but
could not; his lips suddenly went dry. And when Elspeth said the words
that were so difficult to him, he wondered, "Did she say that because
she knew I wished it?" But he decided that she did not, for she was
evidently looking forward to to-morrow, and he knew she would be
shuddering if she thought her Tommy was slipping.

"I am so glad it was she who asked me," Grizel said to him when he
told her. "Don't you see what it means? It means that she wants to get
you out of the way! You are not everything to her now as you used to
be. Are you glad, glad?"

"If I could believe it!" Tommy said.

"What else could make her want to be alone with him?"

Nothing else could have made Grizel want to be alone with him, and
she must always judge others by herself. But Tommy knew that Elspeth
was different, and that a girl with some of himself in her might want
to be alone with a man who admired her without wanting to marry him.

CHAPTER XV

BY PROSEN WATER

That day by the banks of Prosen Water was one of Grizel's beautiful
memories. All the days when she thought he loved her became beautiful
memories.

It was the time of reds and whites, for the glory of the broom had
passed, except at great heights, and the wild roses were trooping in.
When the broom is in flame there seems to be no colour but yellow; but
when the wild roses come we remember that the broom was flaunting. It
was not quite a lady, for it insisted on being looked at; while these
light-hearted things are too innocent to know that there is anyone to
look. Grizel was sitting by the side of the stream, adorning her hat
fantastically with roses red and white and some that were neither.
They were those that cannot decid