ndeed, Pennington, she thought, was what kept her
from missing girls so.

He never told her anything about himself. He might or might not have
been a remittance man; but he mentioned no remittances, at least. Once
he spoke of his childhood, the kind of childhood she had read sometimes
in English children's books, not like her own prim American suburban
memories of Sunday-school and being sent to school and store, and
sometimes playing in her back yard with other little girls. He had had
a pony, and brothers and sisters to play with, and a governess, she
gathered; and an uncle who was an admiral, and came home once to them
in his full uniform, as a treat, so they could see how he looked in it.
And there had been a nurse, and near by was a park where the tale went
that there were goblins. But it all must have been very long ago, she
thought, because Pennington looked forty and over. And all his stories
stopped short before he was ten. After that he went to Eton, he told
her, and told her no more.

She did not ask. She liked him, but, after all, he was not an
important figure in her life. The goal she never forgot was Francis's
admission that she was an honorable woman; and, underneath that,
Francis's missing her terribly when she was through and left. Still,
when Pennington would come and demand tea from her of a Sunday, and she
would sit in her little living-room, or out on the veranda, with the
quaint yellow tea-set that was a part of the furnishings, and pour it
for him and one or two of the other men, she would like having him
about. He talked as interestingly as Logan, but not as egotistically.
She felt as if she were quite a wonderful person when he sat on the
step below her, and surrounded her with a soft deference that was
almost caressing, but not quite. And in spite of Francis's warnings
she made more and more of a friend of him.

The explosion came one Sunday afternoon in June. She came out on the
veranda, as usual, with her tea-tray, about four, and waited for her
court. Peggy came over once in awhile on Sundays, too. Logan never
came. Peggy had never said any more about him since her one outburst,
but Marjorie knew that he was ill yet, and being nursed by the O'Maras.
This day no Peggy appeared. Indeed, nobody appeared for some time, and
Marjorie began to think of putting away the tea-things and considering
the men's supper. And then, just as she had come to this resolve,
Pennington came t