latefuls of meat to his
father, to Jack, and finally one to his own little self.

Then Betty went out of the room, and came back with a large dish of
macaroni cheese, which she put on a side table. Jack got up and whispered
something to her rather angrily. He was evidently remonstrating with her
for not having allowed him to go and get the dish, for he motioned her
rather imperiously back to her seat by her father, while he himself,
calling to Dolly to help him, dealt out generous portions of macaroni
cheese to those who had not taken meat.

All at once Timmy exclaimed in his shrill voice:--"I like macaroni
cheese. Why shouldn't I have a little to-day, too? Here, Tom, you take
my meat, and I'll have your macaroni cheese." He did not wait for Tom's
assent to this peculiar proposal, and was proceeding to effect the
exchange when Tom muttered crossly, while yet, or so Radmore fancied,
casting rather longing eyes at Timmy's plate.

"You know perfectly well you've got to have meat to drive the ghosties
out of your silly head."

Timmy submitted with a grunt of disappointment, and the meal proceeded.
Again Radmore felt surprised and puzzled. Was it conceivable that the
whole family--with the exception of Mr. Tosswill, Jack and Timmy, had
become so High Church that Friday was with them a meatless day?

CHAPTER XI

After her visitors had gone, Mrs. Crofton had come back slowly,
languidly, to her easy-chair.

It was too warm for a fire, yet somehow the fire comforted her, for she
felt cold as well as tired, and, yes, she could admit it to herself,
horribly disappointed. How stupid men were--even clever men!

It was so stupid of Godfrey Radmore not to have come to see her, this the
first time, alone. He might have found it difficult to have come without
one of the Tosswill girls, but there was no reason and no excuse for his
being accompanied by that odious little Timmy. It was also really unkind
of the boy to have brought his horrid dog with him. Even now she seemed
to hear Flick's long-drawn-out howls--those horrible howls that at the
time she had not believed to be real. What a nervous, hysterical fool
she was becoming! How long would she go on being haunted by the now
fast-disappearing past?

There came back to Enid Crofton the very last words uttered by Piper, the
clever, capable man who, after having been Colonel Crofton's batman in
the War, had become their general factotum in Essex:--"Don't you go and
be