me."

"Well, you may be right. Anyway, don't talk to her, mother. Leave her
alone!"

Mrs. Penfold sighed deeply.

"Just think, Susy, what it would be like"--she dropped her
voice--"'_Countess_ Tatham!'--can't you see her going to the
drawing-room--with her feathers and her tiara? Wouldn't she be
lovely--wouldn't she have the world at her feet? Think what your
father would have said."

"I don't believe those things ever enter Lydia's mind!"

Mrs. Penfold slowly shook her head.

"It isn't human," she said plaintively, "it really isn't." And in a
mournful silence she returned to her embroidery.

Susan invaded her sister's bedroom late that night, and found Lydia
before her looking-glass enveloped in shimmering clouds of hair. The
younger sister sat down on the edge of the bed with her arms folded.

"Why are you so slack about this Delorme plan, Lydia? I don't believe you
want to go."

Lydia turned with a start.

"But of course I want to go! It's the greatest chance. I shall learn a
heap of things."

Susan nodded.

"All the same you don't seem a bit keen."

Lydia fidgeted.

"Well, you see, I admire Mr. Delorme's work as much as ever. But--"

"You don't like Mr. Delorme? The greatest egotist I ever saw," said the
uncompromising Susan, who, as a dramatist, prided herself on a knowledge
of character.

"Ah, but a great, great painter!" cried Lydia. "Don't dissuade me, Susan.
Professionally--I must do it!"

"It's not because Mr. Delorme is an egotist, that you don't want to go
away," said Susan, quietly. "It's for quite a different reason."

"What do you mean?"

"It's because--no, I don't mind if I do make you angry!--it's because
you're so desperately interested in Mr. Faversham."

"Really, Susan!" The cloud of hair was thrown back, and Lydia's face
emerged, the clear, indignant eyes shining in the candlelight.

"Oh, I don't mean that you're in love with him--wish you were! But you're
roping him in--just like Lord Tatham. And as he's the latest, he's the
most--well, exciting!"

Susan with her chin in her hands, and her dusky countenance very much
alive, seemed to be playing her sister with cautious mockery--feeling her
way.

"Dear Susy--I don't know why you're so unkind--and unjust," said Lydia,
after a moment, in the tone of one wounded.

"How am I unkind? You're the practical one of us three. You run us and
take care of us. We know we're stupids compared to you. But really mamma
and I stand a