ng on hers."

"Then of course she won't like your changing."

"I dare say she won't like it at all."

"Do you mean to say you'll have a regular kick-up with her?"

"I don't exactly know what you mean by a regular kick-up. We shall
naturally have a great deal of discussion--if she consents to discuss
the matter at all. That's why you must decidedly give her two or three
days."

"I see you think she _may_ refuse to discuss it at all," said Owen.

"I'm only trying to be prepared for the worst. You must remember that to
have to withdraw from the ground she has taken, to make a public
surrender of what she has publicly appropriated, will go uncommonly hard
with her pride."

Owen considered; his face seemed to broaden, but not into a smile. "I
suppose she's tremendously proud, isn't she?" This might have been the
first time it had occurred to him.

"You know better than I," said Fleda, speaking with high extravagance.

"I don't know anything in the world half so well as you. If I were as
clever as you I might hope to get round her." Owen hesitated; then he
went on: "In fact I don't quite see what even you can say or do that
will really fetch her."

"Neither do I, as yet. I must think--I must pray!" the girl pursued,
smiling. "I can only say to you that I'll try. I _want_ to try, you
know--I want to help you." He stood looking at her so long on this that
she added with much distinctness: "So you must leave me, please, quite
alone with her. You must go straight back."

"Back to the inn?"

"Oh no, back to town. I'll write to you to-morrow."

He turned about vaguely for his hat.

"There's the chance, of course, that she may be afraid."

"Afraid, you mean, of the legal steps you may take?"

"I've got a perfect case--I could have her up. The Brigstocks say it's
simple stealing."

"I can easily fancy what the Brigstocks say!" Fleda permitted herself to
remark without solemnity.

"It's none of their business, is it?" was Owen's unexpected rejoinder.
Fleda had already noted that no one so slow could ever have had such
rapid transitions.

She showed her amusement. "They've a much better right to say it's none
of mine."

"Well, at any rate, you don't call her names."

Fleda wondered whether Mona did; and this made it all the finer of her
to exclaim in a moment: "You don't know what I shall call her if she
holds out!"

Owen gave her a gloomy glance; then he blew a speck off the crown of his
hat. "But if you