d offer to act
escort to her?--it was such a pleasure to him, poor fellow! And as there
wasn't a single soul left to see them, what harm could there be!

Notwithstanding, the little lady never lost sight of propriety--Garden
was always near enough for her to be able to say, "I've my maid with
me;" and added to this, "Bella Chetwode was in town, very much occupied
it's true, but still that same staunch friend, always good at a pinch,
who, if told that you had been met going to see her, invariably answered
that she expected you. Life is full of surprises, and if one is armed at
all points matters go on so much more smoothly."

Now it happened that on the previous evening Teddy had shown visible
signs of becoming unruly. He didn't see why he should be sent away. Why
could he not stop--stop and have dinner with her?

"Why? Because, in the first place, it wouldn't do; and in the second--I
forgot though," she said; "being a man, I ought to have reversed the
order--there's nothing to give you."

"That don't matter," said Teddy heroically--"I don't care what I eat."

"Oh, don't you; but I do--you might be wanting to eat me."

Teddy threw a look intended to convey that he could conceive no more
delicious morsel.

"There there, say good-bye and go away, do!" she cried. "I declare
you're beginning to get cannibalish already."

And in spite of all further entreaties and a goodly show of ill-humour,
which experience had taught him to keep handy for display, Teddy was
forced to obey her command that he should take his departure.

"I must take care not to let that boy go too far," Nina reflected when
he had gone. "He wants his paces pulled up now and then, or else he'll
get trying to kick over. However, it's only for a day or two, and then I
shall be off; and by next season--Oh, he'll have forgotten me, I
daresay."

She did not "daresay" anything of the sort--there was a deal too much
vanity in her composition to willingly give up any homage that had once
been offered to her; but the supposition served as a salve for her
conscience, which in the matter was not altogether easy, for in her
letters to Rowley, and she wrote to him every day, she had never said a
single syllable of having seen Teddy. It was not that she had any wish
to be sly with him; but, reasoning in her own way--what good was there
in telling any one things which would make them uneasy, and Rowley was
such a good fellow, so wrapt up in and devoted to her,--h