nnatural that Diane should go and sit on the
divan beside Dorothea for any exchange of such confidences as could not
be conveniently made from a distance. If she admitted anything on her
own part, it was by implication rather than by direct assertion, and
though she did not promise in words to come to the aid of the youthful
lovers, she allowed the possibility that she would do so to be assumed.

So, in soft, whispered, broken confessions the evening slipped away more
rapidly than the day had done, and by ten o'clock they knew he must be
near. The last touch of welcome came when they passed from room to room,
lighting up the big house in cheerful readiness for its lord's
inspection. When all was done Dorothea stationed herself at a window
near the street; while Diane, with a curious shrinking from what she had
to face, took her seat in the remotest and obscurest corner in the more
distant of the two drawingrooms. When the sound of wheels, followed by a
loud ring at the bell, told her that he was actually at the door, she
felt faint from the violence of her heart's beating.

Dorothea danced into the hail, with a cry and a laugh which were stifled
in her father's embrace. Diane rose instinctively, waiting humbly and
silently where she stood. At their parting she had torn herself, weeping
and protesting, from his arms; but when he came in to find her now, he
would see that she had yielded. The door was half open through which he
was to pass--never again to leave her!

"Diane is in there."

It was Dorothea's voice that spoke, but the reply reached the far
drawing-room only as a murmur of deep, inarticulate bass.

"What's the matter, father?"

Dorothea's clear voice rose above the noise of servants moving articles
of luggage in the hall; but again Diane heard nothing beyond a confused
muttering in answer. She wondered that he did not come to her at once,
though she supposed there was some slight prosaic reason to prevent his
doing so.

"Father"--Dorothea's voice came again, this time with a distinct note of
anxiety--"father, you don't look well. Your eyes are bloodshot."

"I'm quite well, thank you," was the curt reply, this time perfectly
audible to Diane's ears. "Simmons, you fool, don't leave those steamer
rugs down here!"

Diane had never heard him speak so to a servant, and she knew that
something had gone amiss. Perhaps he was annoyed that she had not come
to greet him. Perhaps it was one of the duties of her