ng to me," says Ronayne, rising
lazily to his feet. "I suppose she wants me for a moment. Will you mind
my leaving you for a little, or will you come with me? I shan't be any
time."

"I shall stay here," says Monica. "There, go: she seems quite in a
hurry. Come back when you can."

He runs across the grass to his hostess; and Monica, leaning back in her
chair, gives herself up to thought. Everything is strange, and she is
feeling a little lonely, a little _distraite_, and (but this she will
not allow even to herself) distinctly disappointed. She is trying very
hard to prevent her mind from dwelling upon a certain face that should
be naught to her, when she suddenly becomes conscious of the fact that
some one has come to a standstill close beside her chair. She turns.

CHAPTER VII.

How Monica listens to strange words and suffers herself to be led
away.--How Cupid plants a shaft in Mars, and how Miss Priscilla
finds herself face to face with the enemy.

"You see I failed," says Brian Desmond.

A quick warm blush has dyed Monica's cheeks crimson.

"Ah! it is you," she said. "I thought you had not come."

This betrays the fact that she has been thinking of him, but he is far
too wise a young man in his own generation to take count of it.

"Yes, I came. Three days ago I thought I should have been in London now,
and then I heard _you_ were to be here to-day."

"In what have you failed?" asks she, abruptly, alluding to his opening
sentence.

"Can't you guess? Have you forgotten the last cruel injunction you laid
upon me? 'When next we meet,' you said, 'you are to look straight over
my head and pass on.' Will you believe that twice to-day I obeyed that
mandate? The third time was the charm: it conquered me; I broke my sword
in two and came to you."

"I wish you hadn't," says Monica, sincerely, if impolitely. "I wish you
would go away now, and promise me never to speak to me again. You _know_
I am afraid of you," looking nervously around.

"I don't, indeed; I can't conceive such a situation. You do me a great
injustice, I think. I verily believe if I tried my very hardest I
couldn't instil terror into the smallest child in the village."

"You know what I mean. Of course," scornfully, "I should never be afraid
of a _man_: it is Aunt Priscilla I am afraid of. And see, see _there_!"
in an agony, "she is standing quite close to us, talking to somebody."

"If that is your aunt Priscilla, she is safe f