she was calm again, and pale only for the shadows under
her wide eyes.

She had written her letter to Cheiron--she knew not of such things as
messenger-boys or cabs, and had got Priscilla to post it for her, and
now with enforced quiet awaited his answer which she thought she could
receive on the morrow.

"There has been a crisis in the Cabinet, has there not?" she said to her
stepfather, hoping to hear something, and James Anderton replied that
there had been some split--but for his part, the sooner this rotten lot
of sleepers had gone out the better he would be pleased; a good sound
Radical he was, like his friend Mr. Hanbury-Green.

Halcyone abruptly turned the conversation. She could not, she felt,
discuss her beloved and his opinions, even casually, with this man of
another class.

Oh! her poor mother--her poor, sweet mother! How terrible it must have
been to her to be married to such a person!--though her common sense
prompted her to add he was probably, under her influence, not nearly so
coarse and bluff in those days as now he appeared to be.

Her little stepbrother, James Albert, had not returned from his private
school for the summer holidays, so she perhaps would not see him during
her visit.

As the dinner went on everything struck her as glaring, from the
footmen's liveries to the bunches of red carnations; and the blazing
electric lights confused her brain. She, the little country mouse,
accustomed only to old William's gentle shufflings, and the two tall
silver candlesticks with their one wax taper in each!

She could not eat the rich food, and if she had known it, she looked
like a being from some shadowy world among the hearty crew.

Next morning Mr. Carlyon received her letter as he began his early
breakfast; and he tugged at his silver beard, while his penthouse brows
met.

The matter required the most careful consideration. He enormously
disliked to have to play the role of arbiter of fate, but he loved
Halcyone more than anything else in the world, and felt bound to use
what force he possessed to secure her happiness--or, if that looked too
difficult, which he admitted it did, he must try and save her from
further unnecessary pain.

He had the day before received John Derringham's letter written from
Wendover and which Mrs. Porrit had redirected, containing the news of
the intended wedding, and it had angered him greatly.

He blazed with indignation! His peerless one to be made to tak