ok time.
She apologized very prettily for her delay, but Sir Philip did not seem
to heed her excuses: he was standing beside the fire, meditatively
tugging at his black beard, and Lady Caroline had some difficulty in
thinking that she could read the expression of his face.

"I do not quite understand all this," she said, with her most amiable
expression of countenance, as she seated herself on the other side of
the soft white hearthrug. "Margaret mentioned Miss Colwyn's name: I am
quite at a loss to imagine how Miss Colwyn comes to be mixed up in the
matter."

"I am very sorry," said Sir Philip, ruefully. "I never thought that
there would be any difficulty. I seem to have offended Margaret most
thoroughly."

Lady Caroline smiled. "Girls soon forget a man's offences," she said,
consolingly. "What did you say?"

And then Sir Philip, with some hesitation, told the story of his plea
for Janetta Colwyn.

The smile was frozen on Lady Caroline's lips. She sat up straight, and
stared at her visitor. When he had quite ended his explanation, she
said, as icily as she knew how to speak--

"And you asked my daughter to justify Miss Colwyn at the cost of her own
feelings--I might almost say, of her own social standing in the
neighborhood!----"

"Isn't that a little too strong, Lady Caroline? Your daughter's social
standing would not be touched in the least by an act of common justice.
No one who heard of it but would honor her for exculpating her friend!"

"Exculpating! My dear Philip, you are too Quixotic! Nobody accuses
either of the girls of anything but a little thoughtlessness and
defiance of authority----"

"Exactly," said Philip, with some heat, "and therefore while the report
of it will not injure your daughter, it may do irreparable harm to a
girl who has her own way to make in the world. The gossip of Beaminster
tea-tables is not to be despised. The old ladies of Beaminster are all
turning their backs on Miss Colwyn, because common report declares her
to have been expelled--or dismissed--in disgrace from Miss Polehampton's
school. The fact that nobody knows exactly _why_ she was dismissed adds
weight to the injury. It is so easy to say, 'They don't tell why she was
sent away--something too dreadful to be talked about,' and so on. My
mother tells me that there is a general feeling abroad that Miss Colwyn
is not a person to be trusted with young girls. Now that is a terrible
slur upon an innocent woman who has to