hift. And she, being as
equally feminine, took up her new position with renewed vigour. Her
voice was full of a most righteous scorn when she spoke.

"I didn't laugh at you. But suppose I did. I'd be justified. Why should
I want to marry you? You're not even a man yet. You're just a boy.
You've never done anything a man should. You even let that kid Jenkins
beat you this afternoon. You're just a good-for-nothing lazybones,
that's what you are, and you want me to marry you."

Roger tried unsuccessfully to interrupt her, each time she paused for
breath, but it only seemed to intensify the flow of her condemnation.
He grew more and more uncomfortable, because part, at least, of what she
said, he knew to be true.

"I didn't mean to start anything like this," he put in mournfully. "I
don't know how it ever started."

She did not know either, but she managed to convey to him the conviction
that it was most deliberate. And that, as she knew it would, only made
him more mournful still. It was in a very chastened voice and manner
that he acquiesced in her suggestion that they return to the house.

He would have been astonished, as they walked silently in, had he known
the very intense desire that consumed her, to kiss him.

From the funereal aspect of Roger's countenance, and the contented
cheerfulness of Molly's, as they entered the room, Judith was able to
surmise very shrewdly something of what had taken place. She ached to
tell her doleful brother what, with true masculine obtuseness, he never
in the world would guess.

Indoors, the evening dragged along, uneventful to the point of
stupidity. There was a little excitement, not unmixed with acerbity,
when Ned Alder, contrary to his usual habit, proved clever enough with
the cards to add a not inconsiderable sum to his already swollen
fortune. But his amazed joy was more than offset by Roger's patent
depression and Molly's inexplicable apathy. Altogether it was not as
successful a party, as it had given promise of being, and it broke up
early.

As the adieus were being said, Judith realised that Good was missing. In
the early part of the evening, he had wandered in and out, now watching
the play, now chatting momentarily with someone who was free; but had
finally disappeared. She could not believe that his unceremonious
absence was permanent, although she knew that that was not impossible.
So as soon as she could, after attending to the comfort of those who
were to s