he heard her husband ride out of the
stable yard. So Patsy had been late. Was it possible he had
overslept? It would be so unlike Patsy, who, especially of a hunting
morning, had always slept the fox's sleep.

She had a long day before her, with many things to do. She ought to
write to Terry, but she knew the things Terry expected to hear. There
had been a letter from him, asking roundly for news of Stella.

"Why don't you write?" it asked. "Are you going to treat me like a
child as Father does? I've made up my mind about Stella. I will marry
her, if she will have me; and she shall never know anything from me.
Are you looking after her, keeping her happy? For Heaven's sake don't
take Father's view of it! That would be ruin to everything, but I warn
you, that if you do, it will not alter me. Tell me what she says, how
she looks. Has her colour come back? Does she speak of me? There are
a thousand things I want to know."

There had been a postscript to the letter.

"By the way, Evelyn has discovered that the man who got the lakh of
rupees,--you remember?--had been rather badly treated by Eileen, or so
Evelyn's informant said. It is a she--a cousin of Evelyn's who is
married to somebody up there. Evelyn says he will come again to Castle
Talbot if you ask him. He says the duck-shooting was splendid--and he
congratulated me on you--darling. I did myself proud. Just
imagine,--Evelyn!"

She did not know how to answer his letter. It was not in her to put
off the boy with a letter which should disappoint him. She imagined
him running through it with a blank face, looking for what she had not
written. No: she could not write without telling him the truth: and
the truth would make the boy miserable. She supposed it would have to
be told--presently, but she would wait till then. She was not one to
deal in half-truths and subterfuges.

She went forth after breakfast with an intention of seeing Stella, and
afterwards going on to old Lizzie Brennan, who required some looking
after, in cold weather especially. She had rather mad fits of
wandering over the country, from which she would return soaked through
with rain, hungry and exhausted. More than once Lady O'Gara had
discovered her after these expeditions, choking with bronchitis, in a
fireless room, too weak to light a fire or prepare food for herself.
Lady Conyers, a neighbour of Castle Talbot at Mount Esker, had tried to
induce Lizzie to go