was determined to see you again. How do you do, Teddy?" says
Miss Massereene, coming up to him, smiling saucily, although a little
tremulously. "Will you not even shake hands with me?"

He takes her hand, presses it coldly, and drops it again almost
instantly.

"I am glad to see you looking so well," he says, gravely, perhaps
reproachfully.

"I am sorry to see you looking so ill," replies she, softly, and then
begins to wonder what on earth she shall say next.

Mr. Luttrell, with his cane, takes the heads off two unoffending
crocuses that, most unwisely, have started up within his reach. He is
the gentlest-natured fellow alive, but he feels a vicious pleasure in
the decapitation of those yellow, harmless flowers. His eyes are on the
ground. He is evidently bent on silence. On such occasions what is
there that can be matched in stupidity with a man?

"I got your letter," Molly says, awkwardly, when the silence has gone
past bearing.

"I know."

"I did not answer it."

"I know that too," with some faint bitterness.

"It was too foolish a letter to answer," returns she, hastily, detecting
the drop of acid in his tone. "And, even if I had written then, I should
only have said some harsh things that might have hurt you. I think I was
wise in keeping silence."

"You were. But I cannot see how you have followed up your wisdom by
having me here to-day."

There is a little pause, and, then:

"I wanted so much to see you," murmurs she, in the softest, sweetest of
voices.

He winces, and shifts his position uneasily, but steadily refuses to
meet her beseeching eyes. He visits two more unhappy crocuses with
capital punishment, and something that is almost a sigh escapes him;
but he will not look up, and he will not trust himself to answer her.

"Have you grown cruel, Teddy?" goes on Molly, in a carefully modulated
tone. "You are killing those poor crocuses that have done you no harm.
And you are killing me too, and what harm have _I_ done you? Just
as I began to see some chance of happiness before us, you ran away (you
a soldier, to show the white feather!), and thereby ruined all the
enjoyment I might have known in my good fortune. Was that kind?"

"I meant to be kind, Molly; I am kind," replies he huskily.

"Very cruel kindness, it seems to me."

"Later on you will not think so."

"It strikes me, Teddy," says Miss Massereene, reprovingly, "you are
angry because poor grandpapa chose to leave me Herst."