addressed his mind to the more practical question. The outcome,
different as the source was, was the same old verdict.

"We must tell Calder, my dear. It isn't right to keep him in the dark."

"I can't tell him. Why must he be told?"

"Well," said Lord Thrapston, "it's just possible, Aggy, that he may
have something to say to it, isn't it?"

"I don't mind what he says," declared Agatha.

"Eh? Why, I thought you were so fond of him."

"So I am."

"And as you're going to marry him

"I never said I was going to marry him. I only said he might be engaged
to me, if he liked."

"Oho! So this young Merceron----"

"Not at all, grandpapa. Oh, I do wish somebody would help me!"

Lord Thrapston rose from his seat.

"You must do what you like," he said. "I'm going to tell Calder."

"Oh, why?"

"Because," he answered, "I'm a man of honor."

Before the impressive invocation of her grandfather's one religion,
Agatha's opposition collapsed.

"I suppose he must be told," she admitted mournfully. "I expect he'll
never speak to me again, and I'm sure Mr. Merceron won't;" and she sat
on the footstool, the picture of dejection.

Lord Thrapston was moved to enunciate a solemn truth.

"Aggy," said he, shaking his finger at her, "in this world you can't
have your fun for nothing." But then he spoilt it by adding
regretfully, "More's the pity!" and off he hobbled to the club, intent
on finding Calder Wentworth.

For some time after he went, Agatha sat on her stool in deep thought.
Then she rose, sat down at the writing-table, took a pen, and began to
bite the end of it. At last she started to write:

"I don't know whether I ought to write or not, but I must tell you how
it happened. Oh, don't think too badly of me! I came down just because
I had heard so much about the Court and I wanted to see it, and I came
as I did with Nettie Wallace just for fun. I never meant to say I was a
dress-maker, you know; but people would ask questions and I had to say
something. I never, never thought of you. I thought you were about
fifteen. And you know--oh, you must know--that I met you quite by
accident, and was just as surprised as you were. And the rest was all
your fault. I didn't want to come again; you know I refused ever so
many times; and you promised you wouldn't come if I came, and then you
did come. It was really all your fault. And I'm very, very sorry, and
you must please try to forgive me, dear Mr. Merceron, and not think