ay of looking at her when she was in high
spirits or something of the sort that was like a douche of cold water.
I have had the lame experience myself. Eileen said something the other
day about 'at your age.' I felt ninety, all of a sudden."

"Nonsense, Mary! Eileen adores you."

Lady O'Gara said no more. She let pass, with a shrug of her shoulders,
her husband's accusation that she was fickle like Terry, putting away
the old love for the new.

Suddenly Sir Shawn asked a direct question.

"Are you quite certain about Stella's parentage, Mary? She _is_ the
child of that French soldier, St. Maur, was it? and the Irish
governess?"

"Of course, Shawn."

It had never occurred to Lady O'Gara to doubt it.

She looked at her husband with wondering eyes. The lights in her brown
eyes were as deep and quiet now as when she was in her young beauty.
She had a sudden illumination. Was _that_ the bee in Shawn's bonnet?
There had been a certain silence about Stella's parentage. She thought
she understood it. Mrs. Comerford had always been jealous of her
loves. She did not wish it recalled that Stella, whom she adored, had
not belonged to her by any tie of blood. Shawn must have got it into
his head that the mystery might cover something disgraceful.

"You may be quite sure, Shawn," she said, her candid eyes fixed on him:
"There was nothing to conceal. Aunt Grace has told me _everything_."

His face cleared. "Then I confess," he said almost gaily, "that Stella
is a young angel. Perhaps I was too hard on Terry."

The evenings began to draw in. Sir Shawn missed his boy. The hunting
season was at hand. The opening meet was to be at Dunmara Cross-Roads
in a fortnight's time. Lady O'Gara went out perhaps once a week. The
other days Sir Shawn would miss Terry jogging along beside him, on the
way to the meet in the morning, full of cheerful anticipation; riding
homewards, tired and happy, in the dusk. Stella had never ridden to
hounds. She had done little riding, indeed, since the days at the
advanced Roman Convent when the girls went out on the Campagna in a
flock, in charge of a discreet riding master, of unimpeachable age and
plainness.

He was thinking as he rode home one evening, with the dusk closing in,
that it would be pleasant to have Stella with him when Mary was not
available. It was one tangible thing against Eileen that she did not
like horses. Anthony Creagh's daughter! It seemed incredible to