her joyful
tone; "at least I hope so--I mean" (again correcting myself)--"I _think_
so."

Somehow I feel dissatisfied with my own explanations, and recommence:

"The boys--that is, my brothers--will soon be scattered to the ends of
the earth; Algy has got his commission, and Bobby will soon be sent to a
foreign station--he is in the navy, you will understand; and so we all
want to be together once again before they go."

"You are not going home _really_, then?" inquires my companion, with a
slight shade of disappointment in his tone; "not to _Tempest_--that is?"

"What a number of questions you do ask!" say I, impatiently. "Of what
possible interest can it be to you where we are going?"

"Only that I shall be your nearest neighbor," replies he, stiffly; "and,
as Sir Roger has hardly ever been down hitherto, I am rather tired of
living next an empty house."

"Our nearest neighbor!" cry I, with animation, opening my eyes. "Not
_really_? Well, I am rather glad! Only yesterday I was asking Sir Roger
whether there were many young people about. And _how_ near are you?
_Very_ near?"

"About as near as I well can be," answers he, dryly. "My lodge exactly
faces yours."

"Too close," say I, shaking my head. "We shall quarrel."

"And do you mean to say," in a tone of attempted lightness that but
badly disguises a good deal of hurt conceit, "that you never heard my
name before?"

Again I shake my head.

"Never! and, what is more, I do not think I know what it is now: I
suppose I did not listen very attentively, but I do not think I caught
it."

"And your tone says" (with a very considerable accession of huffiness)
"that you are supremely indifferent as to whether you _ever_ catch it."

I laugh.

"_Catch_ it! you talk as if it were a _disease_. Well" (speaking
demurely), "perhaps on the whole it _would_ be more convenient if I were
to know it."

Silence.

"Well! what is it?"

No answer.

"I shall have to ask at your lodge!"

"Who _can_ pronounce his _own_ name in cold blood?" he says, reddening a
little. "I, for one, cannot--there--if you do not mind looking at this
card--"

He takes one out of his pocket, and I stop--we are slowly strolling
back--under a lamp, to read it:

MR. FRANCIS MUSGRAVE,
MUSGRAVE ABBEY.

"Oh, thanks--_Musgrave_--yes."

"And Sir Roger has never mentioned me to you _really_?" he says,
recurring with persistent hurt vanity to the topic. "How very odd of
him!"

"Not i