about his bland cherubic face, his mild
blue eyes with their trick of turning red on small provocation, and his
lisping manner of speech, ingenuous, interrogatory, and knowing nothing
when interrogated in his turn--somehow gleaning full ears wherever he
passed, and dropping not even a solitary stalk of straw in return. He
expressed his sorrow that he had not seen lately his young friend, Miss
Dundas.

"In my secluded life," he said, his eyelids reddening, "she is like a
beautiful bird that flashes through the dull sky for a moment, but
leaves the atmosphere brighter than before." He glanced round the room
as if looking for her. "I hope she is well?" he added, not attempting to
conceal a certain accent of disappointment at her absence.

"Quite well when I heard from her," answered Mr. Dundas, doing his best
to speak without embarrassment.

Mr. Gryce turned his face in frank astonishment on the speaker. "Ah! She
is from home, then?" he asked.

"Yes," said Mr. Dundas curtly.

"I had not heard," lisped the tenant of Lionnet. "But I myself have been
from home for a few days, and have just returned. Though, indeed,
present or absent, I know very little of my neighbors' doings, as you
may see. I did not even know that Miss Dundas was from home."

"Yet it was pretty widely talked about," said Mr. Dundas, with a certain
suspicious glance at the cherubic face smiling innocently into his.

"Doubtless the absence of Miss Dundas must have caused a gap," replied
Mr. Gryce, "but you see, as I said, I have been away myself, and when I
am at home I do not gossip."

"Have--Where have you been?" asked Mr. Dundas abruptly, with that sudden
glance as suddenly withdrawn which tells of a half-formed suspicion
neither dwelt on nor clearly made out.

"To Paris," said Mr. Gryce demurely. "I went to see--"

"Oh! you went to see Notre Dame and La Madeleine of course," interrupted
Sebastian satirically.

"No," answered Mr. Gryce with a cherubic smile. "Strange to say, I had
business connected with that odd drama of _Le Sphinx_."

There was not much more talk after this, and Mr. Gryce soon took his
leave, desiring to be most respectfully remembered to Miss Dundas when
her father next wrote, and to say that he was keeping some pretty
specimens of moths for her on her return; both of which messages
Sebastian promised to convey at the earliest opportunity, improvising a
counter-remark of Leam's which he was sorry he could not remember
ac