ther hand nor head. Such behaviour is so unknown that Miss Pembroke
did not realize what had happened, and kept her own hand stretched out
longer than is maidenly.

"Coming to supper?" asked Ansell in low, grave tones.

"I don't think so," said Rickie helplessly.

Ansell departed without another word.

"Don't mind us," said Miss Pembroke pleasantly. "Why shouldn't you keep
your engagement with your friend? Herbert's finding lodgings,--that's
why he's not here,--and they're sure to be able to give us some dinner.
What jolly rooms you've got!"

"Oh no--not a bit. I say, I am sorry. I am sorry. I am most awfully
sorry."

"What about?"

"Ansell" Then he burst forth. "Ansell isn't a gentleman. His father's a
draper. His uncles are farmers. He's here because he's so clever--just
on account of his brains. Now, sit down. He isn't a gentleman at all."
And he hurried off to order some dinner.

"What a snob the boy is getting!" thought Agnes, a good deal mollified.
It never struck her that those could be the words of affection--that
Rickie would never have spoken them about a person whom he disliked.
Nor did it strike her that Ansell's humble birth scarcely explained
the quality of his rudeness. She was willing to find life full of
trivialities. Six months ago and she might have minded; but now--she
cared not what men might do unto her, for she had her own splendid
lover, who could have knocked all these unhealthy undergraduates into
a cocked-hat. She dared not tell Gerald a word of what had happened: he
might have come up from wherever he was and half killed Ansell. And she
determined not to tell her brother either, for her nature was kindly,
and it pleased her to pass things over.

She took off her gloves, and then she took off her ear-rings and began
to admire them. These ear-rings were a freak of hers--her only freak.
She had always wanted some, and the day Gerald asked her to marry him
she went to a shop and had her ears pierced. In some wonderful way she
knew that it was right. And he had given her the rings--little gold
knobs, copied, the jeweller told them, from something prehistoric and
he had kissed the spots of blood on her handkerchief. Herbert, as usual,
had been shocked.

"I can't help it," she cried, springing up. "I'm not like other girls."
She began to pace about Rickie's room, for she hated to keep quiet.
There was nothing much to see in it. The pictures were not attractive,
nor did they attract her-