though for an explanation.

"Well?"

"This is the third morning that Lumley has joined Margharita and Gracie
in their walk."

"Very good natured of him," the Earl replied carelessly. "He always was
fond of Gracie though, wasn't he?"

"I wish I could feel sure that it was entirely for Gracie's sake," she
answered anxiously.

Her husband whistled, and his brows contracted a little.

"You mean to suggest, I suppose, that Miss Briscoe is the attraction,"
he remarked thoughtfully.

"How can I help thinking so? Both yesterday and this morning he was in
the schoolroom until I heard her tell him quite severely that he must
go, as he was interrupting their work. Both mornings I have asked him to
drive with me, and each time he made an excuse. If Margharita's name is
mentioned before him, he is either unusually silent and reserved, or
very talkative. As a rule, you know, Lumley does not care for girls.
That makes me all the more anxious."

"Miss Briscoe is certainly wonderfully beautiful," he said. "Yet I think
that Lumley has common sense."

"He has peculiar ideas," his wife answered. "I have always been afraid
of his doing something _bizarre_, and as you say, Margharita is
wonderfully beautiful--far more so than her mother, I think. What would
you advise me to do, Geoffrey?"

He stroked his long gray mustache, and looked thoughtful.

"It's a delicate matter," he said. "To even hint at the girl going away
because Lumley admires her would be unjust, and, at the same time, if
Lumley got an inkling of the reason it would certainly make him think
more of her than he does now. You have no fault to find with her in any
way?"

"None! absolutely none! Her behavior is perfect. She is proud, but I do
not consider that a fault. Her manners are the manners of a
perfectly-bred lady."

"And Gracie likes her?"

"Gracie adores her!"

"She certainly doesn't attempt to encourage Lumley in any way," the Earl
continued thoughtfully.

"Her manners and behavior, in fact, her whole conduct, is perfectly
irreproachable," Lady St. Maurice acknowledged. "In certain ways she has
been a great disappointment to me, but I wish to be just to her, and I
feel bound to say so. It makes the situation all the more difficult."

"In that case we can do nothing," her husband said decidedly. "Things
must take their course. If they develop, as we will hope they may not, I
will speak to Lumley privately."

"You see she is coming back because Lum