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ent makes servants impertinent." "I do not care to hear your criticism of my guardian, Gregory." "I beg your pardon," said Gregory. Betty Jardine met him on a windy April evening in Queen Anne's Gate. "I see that you had to sacrifice me, Gregory," she said. She smiled; she bore no grudge; but her smile was tinged with a shrewd pity. He felt that he flushed. "You mean that you've not been to see us since the occasion." "I've not been asked!" Betty laughed. "Madame von Marwitz is with us, you know," Gregory proffered rather lamely. "Yes; I do know. How do you like having a genius domiciled? I hear that she is introducing Karen into a very artistic set. After the Bannisters, Mr. Claude Drew. He is back from America at last, it seems, and is an assiduous adorer. You have seen a good deal of him?" "I haven't seen him at all. Has he been back for long?" "Four or five days only, I believe; but I don't know how often he and Madame von Marwitz and Karen have been seen together. Don't think me a cat, Gregory; but if she is engaged in a flirtation with that most unpleasant young man I hope you will see to it that Karen isn't used as a screen. There have been some really horrid stories about him, you know." Gregory parted from his sister-in-law, perturbed. Indiscreet and naughty she might be, but Betty was not a cat. The veil of ice was so impenetrable that no sound of Karen's daily life came to him through it. He had not an idea of what she did with herself when he wasn't there, or, rather, of what Madame von Marwitz did with her. "You've been seeing something of Mr. Claude Drew, I hear," he said to Karen that evening. "Do you like him better than you used to do?" They were in the drawing-room before dinner and dinner had been, as usual, waiting for half an hour for Madame von Marwitz. Gregory's voice betrayed more than a kindly interest, and Karen answered coldly, if without suspicion; "No; I do not like him better. But Tante likes him. It is not I who see him, it is Tante. I am only with them sometimes." "And I? Am I to be with them sometimes?" Gregory inquired with an air of gaiety. "If you will come back to tea to-morrow, Gregory," she answered gravely, "you will meet him. He comes to tea then." For the last few days Gregory had fallen into the habit of only getting back in time for dinner. "You know it's only because I usually find that you've gone out with your guardian that I haven't come
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