e Parthian shot. "The poor child does
love horses so," she murmured softly.

The host scowled and fidgeted in his chair with a brusque gesture to
Mrs. Forbes to remove the course.

"Harry has turned up again," he remarked, to change the subject.

"Really?" returned his daughter-in-law languidly. "For how long I
wonder?"

"He thinks it is permanent."

"He is still in Chicago?"

"Yes, for a day or two. He and his wife sail for Europe immediately."

"Indeed!" with a greater show of interest. Then, curiously, "Are you
sending them, father?"

"Scarcely! They are going on business."

"Oh," relapsing into indifference. "They have a child, I believe."

"Yes, a girl. I should think perhaps you might have remembered it."

"I hardly see why, if Harry didn't--a fact he plainly showed by
deserting the poor creature." The insolence of the speaker's tone was
scarcely veiled. Her extreme disapproval of her father-in-law sometimes
welled to the surface of her suave manner.

Mr. Evringham's thoughts had fled to Chicago. "Harry proposed leaving
the girl here while they are gone," he said.

Mrs. Evringham straightened in her chair and her attention concentrated.
"With you? What assurance! How like Harry!" she exclaimed.

The words were precisely those which her host had been saying to
himself; but proceeding from her lips they had a strange effect upon
him.

"You find it so?" he asked. The clearer the proposition became to Mrs.
Evringham's consciousness the more she resented it. To have the child
in the house not only would menace her ease and comfort, but meant
a possibility that the grandfather might take an interest in Harry's
daughter which would disturb Eloise's chances.

"Of course it does. I call it simply presumptuous," she declared with
emphasis.

"After all, Harry has some rights," rejoined Mr. Evringham slowly.

"His wife is a dressmaker," went on the other. "I had it directly from
a Chicago friend. Harry has scarcely been with the child since she was
born. And to saddle a little stranger like that on you! Now Eloise and
_her_ father were inseparable."

There was an ominous glitter in Mr. Evringham's eyes. "Eloise's father!"
he returned slowly. "I did not know that she remembered him."

The hurt of his tone and words sank deep into the heart of the girl, but
she looked up courageously.

"Your son was my father in every best sense," she said. "We were
inseparable. You must have known it."

"You appear