nings at Speyer, in the spring. Perhaps the elder lady, as she
gazed at the vulgar, ruddy cathedral, and listened to the talk of her
husband and Helen, may have detected in the other and less charming of
the sisters a deeper sympathy, a sounder judgment. She was capable
of detecting such things. Perhaps it was she who had desired the Miss
Schlegels to be invited to Howards End, and Margaret whose presence she
had particularly desired. All this is speculation; Mrs. Wilcox has left
few clear indications behind her. It is certain that she came to call at
Wickham Place a fortnight later, the very day that Helen was going with
her cousin to Stettin.

"Helen!" cried Fraulein Mosebach in awestruck tones (she was now in
her cousin's confidence)--"his mother has forgiven you!" And then,
remembering that in England the new-comer ought not to call before she
is called upon, she changed her tone from awe to disapproval, and opined
that Mrs. Wilcox was keine Dame.

"Bother the whole family!" snapped Margaret. "Helen, stop giggling and
pirouetting, and go and finish your packing. Why can't the woman leave
us alone?"

"I don't know what I shall do with Meg," Helen retorted, collapsing upon
the stairs. "She's got Wilcox and Box upon the brain. Meg, Meg, I don't
love the young gentleman; I don't love the young gentleman, Meg, Meg.
Can a body speak plainer?"

"Most certainly her love has died," asserted Fraulein Mosebach.

"Most certainly it has, Frieda, but that will not prevent me from being
bored with the Wilcoxes if I return the call."

Then Helen simulated tears, and Fraulein Mosebach, who thought her
extremely amusing, did the same. "Oh, boo hoo! boo hoo hoo! Meg's
going to return the call, and I can't. 'Cos why? 'Cos I'm going to
German-eye."

"If you are going to Germany, go and pack; if you aren't, go and call on
the Wilcoxes instead of me."

"But, Meg, Meg, I don't love the young gentleman; I don't love the
young--O lud, who's that coming down the stairs? I vow 'tis my brother.
O crimini!"

A male--even such a male as Tibby--was enough to stop the foolery. The
barrier of sex, though decreasing among the civilised, is still high,
and higher on the side of women. Helen could tell her sister all, and
her cousin much about Paul; she told her brother nothing. It was not
prudishness, for she now spoke of "the Wilcox ideal" with laughter, and
even with a growing brutality. Nor was it precaution, for Tibby seldom
repeated a