ver, he wondered, see Windyhill again?

He went on to his club, and there some one began to amuse him with an
account of Lady Durford's ball, to which Lady Mariamne had wished to
take him. "Are not those Comptons relations of yours, Tatham?" he said.

"Connections," said John, "by marriage."

"I'm very glad that's all. They are a queer lot. Phil Compton you
know--the dis-Honourable Phil, as he used to be called--but I hear he's
turned over a new leaf----"

"What of him?" said John.

"Oh, nothing much: only that he was flirting desperately all the evening
with a Mrs. Harris, an American widow. I believe he came with her--and
his own wife there--much younger, much prettier, a beautiful young
creature--looking on with astonishment. You could see her eyes growing
bigger and bigger. If it had not been kind of amusing to a looker-on, it
would be the most pitiful sight in the world."

"I advise you not to let yourself be amused by such trifles," said John
Tatham, with a look of fire and flame.

CHAPTER XXIII.

As a matter of fact, Elinor did not go to the Cottage for the fresh air
or anything else. She made one hurried run in the afternoon to bid her
mother good-by, alone, which was not a visit, but the mere pretence of a
visit, hurried and breathless, in which there was no time to talk of
anything. She gave Mrs. Dennistoun an account of the usual lists of
visits that her husband and she were to make in the autumn, which the
mother, with the usual instinct of mothers, thought too much. "You will
wear yourself to death, Elinor."

"Oh, no," she said, "it is not that sort of thing that wears one to
death. I shall--enjoy it, I suppose, as other people do----"

"I don't know about enjoyment, Elinor, but I am sure it would be much
better for you to come and stay here quietly with me."

"Oh, don't talk to me of any paradises, mamma. We are in the working-day
world, and we must make out our life as we can."

"But you might let Philip go by himself and come and stay quietly here
for a little, for the sake of your health, Elinor."

"Not for the world, not for the world," she cried. "I cannot leave
Phil:" and then with a laugh that was full of a nervous thrill, "You
are always thinking of my health, mamma, when my health is perfect:
better, far better, than almost anybody's. The most of them have
headaches and that sort of thing, and they stay in bed for a day or two
constantly, but I never need anything of the kin