ile eye, said to himself that if it hadn't been Lady Lucy it
would have been something else. As it happened, he was quite as well
aware as his mother that Marsham's visits to Beechcote of late had been
far more frequent than mere neighborliness required.

Marsham was in hunting dress, and made his usual handsome and energetic
impression. Diana treated him with great self-possession, asking after
Mr. Ferrier, who had just returned to Tallyn for the last fortnight
before the opening of Parliament, and betraying to the Roughsedges that
she was already on intimate terms with Lady Lucy, who was lending her
patterns for her embroidery, driving over once or twice a week, and
advising her about various household affairs. Mrs. Roughsedge, who had
been Diana's first protector, saw herself supplanted--not without a
little natural chagrin.

The controversy of the moment was submitted to Marsham, who decided
hotly against the Vicar, and implored Diana to stand firm. But somehow
his intervention only hastened the compunction that had already begun to
work in her. She followed the Roughsedges to the door when
they departed.

"What must I do?" she said, sheepishly, to Mrs. Roughsedge. "Write to
him?"

"The Vicar? Oh, dear Miss Mallory, the doctor will settle it. You
_would_-change the books?"

"Mother!" cried Hugh Roughsedge, indignantly, "we're all bullied--you
know we are--and now you want Miss Mallory bullied too."

"'Who would be free, themselves must strike the blow,'" laughed Marsham,
in the background, as he stood toying with his tea beside Mrs. Colwood.

Diana shook her head.

"I can't be friends with him," she said, naively, "for a long long time.
But I'll rewrite my list. And _must_ I go and call on the Miss Bertrams
to-morrow?"

Her mock and smiling submission, as she stood, slender and lovely, amid
the shadows of the hall, seemed to Hugh Roughsedge, as he looked back
upon her, the prettiest piece of acting. Then she turned, and he knew
that she was going back to Marsham. At the same moment he saw Mrs.
Colwood's little figure disappearing up the main stairway. Frowning and
silent, he followed his mother out of the house.

Diana looked round rather wistfully for Mrs. Colwood as she re-entered
the room; but that lady had many letters to write.

Marsham noticed Mrs. Colwood's retreat with a thrill of pleasure. Yet
even now he had no immediate declaration in his mind. The course that he
had marked out for himself h