nts. That's my raw place,
and you hit me on it. What did you say just now? Friends? who are your
friends?" He rubbed his hand savagely over his forehead--it was a way he
had of clearing his mind. "I know," he went on. "I saw your friends just
now. Who's the young lady?" His most intimate companions had never heard
him laugh: they had sometimes seen his thin-lipped mouth widen drearily
into a smile. It widened now. "Whoever she is," he proceeded, "Zo
wonders why you don't kiss her."

This specimen of Benjulia's attempts at pleasantry was not exactly
to Ovid's taste. He shifted the topic to his little sister. "You were
always fond of Zo," he said.

Benjulia looked thoroughly puzzled. Fondness for anybody was, to all
appearance, one of the few subjects on which he had not qualified
himself to offer an opinion. He gave his head another savage rub, and
returned to the subject of the young lady. "Who is she?" he asked again.

"My cousin," Ovid replied as shortly as possible.

"Your cousin? A girl of Lady Northlake's?"

"No: my late uncle's daughter."

Benjulia suddenly came to a standstill. "What!" he cried, "has that
misbegotten child grown up to be a woman?"'

Ovid started. Words of angry protest were on his lips, when he perceived
Teresa and Zo on one side of him, and the keeper of the monkeys on the
other. Benjulia dismissed the man, with the favourable answer which
Zo had already reported. They walked on again. Ovid was at liberty to
speak.

"Do you know what you said of my cousin, just now?" he began.

His tone seemed to surprise the doctor. "What did I say?" he asked.

"You used a very offensive word. You called Carmina a 'misbegotten
child.' Are you repeating some vile slander on the memory of her
mother?"

Benjulia came to another standstill. "Slander?" he repeated--and said no
more.

Ovid's anger broke out. "Yes!" he replied. "Or a lie, if you like, told
of a woman as high above reproach as your mother or mine!"

"You are hot," the doctor remarked, and walked on again. "When I was in
Italy--" he paused to calculate, "when I was at Rome, fifteen years
ago, your cousin was a wretched little rickety child. I said to Robert
Graywell, 'Don't get too fond of that girl; she'll never live to grow
up.' He said something about taking her away to the mountain air. I
didn't think, myself, the mountain air would be of any use. It seems
I was wrong. Well! it's a surprise to me to find her--" he waited, and
calcul