fireplace and the table is
Francesca's favorite "putting green." She wishes to become more deadly
in the matter of approaches, and thinks her tee shots weak; so these
two deficiencies she is trying to make good by home practice in
inclement weather. She turns a tumbler on its side on the floor, and
"puts" the ball into it, or at it, as the case may be, from the
opposite side of the room. It is excellent discipline, and as the
tumblers are inexpensive the breakage really does not matter. Whenever
Miss Grieve hears the shivering of glass, she murmurs, not without
reason, "It is not for the knowing what they will be doing next."

"Penelope, has it ever occurred to you that Elizabeth Ardmore is
seriously interested in Mr. Macdonald?"

Salemina propounded this question to me with the same innocence that a
babe would display in placing a match beside a dynamite bomb.

Francesca naturally heard the remark,--although it was addressed to
me,--pricked up her ears, and missed the tumbler by several feet.

It was a simple inquiry, but as I look back upon it from the safe
ground of subsequent knowledge I perceive that it had a certain amount
of influence upon Francesca's history. The suggestion would have
carried no weight with me for two reasons. In the first place,
Salemina is far-sighted. If objects are located at some distance from
her, she sees them clearly; but if they are under her very nose she
overlooks them altogether, unless they are sufficiently fragrant or
audible to address other senses. This physical peculiarity she carries
over into her mental processes. Her impression of the Disruption
movement, for example, would be lively and distinct, but her
perception of a contemporary lovers' quarrel (particularly if it were
fought at her own apron-strings) would be singularly vague. If she
suggested, therefore, that Elizabeth Ardmore was interested in Mr.
Beresford, who is the rightful captive of my bow and spear, I should
be perfectly calm.

My second reason for comfortable indifference is that, frequently in
novels, and always in plays, the heroine is instigated to violent
jealousy by insinuations of this sort, usually conveyed by the villain
of the piece, male or female. I have seen this happen so often in the
modern drama that it has long since ceased to be convincing; but
though Francesca has witnessed scores of plays and read hundreds of
novels, it did not apparently strike her as a theatrical or literary
suggest