ng?" he asked.

"To catch the twelve thirty-five," replied Amaryllis. "Dick says he can
do it in seven and a half minutes."

Randal not only noticed the christian name, but also the girl's
unconsciousness of having used it.

"They want father at the Home Office. Who's Sir Charles Colombe, Sir
Randal?" she asked.

"Permanent Under Secretary," he answered. "I suppose Broadfoot is making
trouble again."

And he looked at her as if he were thinking of Amaryllis rather than of
permanent or political chiefs of Home Affairs.

"This is Friday, you know," he said at last.

"Yes," replied the girl, and Randal thought her face showed
embarrassment--but of what nature, he could not tell.

"I won't spoil your lunch, my dear child," he said, looking down at her
with eyes curiously contracted. "But if you'll give me half an hour in
the afternoon----"

"Of course I will," she replied, with frank kindness. "And, oh! may I
have a lemon-squash?"

A little later, as he watched her drink it, he admired her more than
ever before. Since he first met her he had taken increasing pleasure
from the tall figure, of which the fine lines and just proportions hid
the strength and energy he had seen her upon occasion display; and he
had often asked himself in what attitude or action her inherent grace
appeared most charming. Sometimes it was driving from the tee, at
another taking a swift volley which she must run to meet; or, again,
just pouring out his coffee. But now, lounging on the old leather sofa,
with her head tipped well back for red lips and white teeth to capture
the slip of ice sliding to them from the bottom of the long tumbler, he
thought her the very perfection of innocent freedom and symmetry.

And when the ice was crunched and swallowed, she laughed joyously,
showing him that the teeth he had cried pity on were sound as ever; so
that he raked his mind for jest and anecdote just that he might see them
flash yet again.

But there was a difference in her to-day--a softer touch, as of
happiness to come, flinging backward in her face a clouded reflection
from the future. The image in that distant mirror, however, he could not
see, and his gaiety failed him.

"I'm awfully untidy," she said at last, springing to her feet and
pushing back loosened hair. "It's nearly lunch time--I hope so, at
least, because I'm horribly hungry."

Perhaps it was best, after all, standing a little to one side, to see
her mount that flight of b