ammock behind the vines. Anthony, talking on about Arizona
and the Larchmont Memorial, kept an eye on the approach to the house from
the corner where visitors always left the car. His watch was rewarded at
length by the sight of a figure rapidly turning the corner and making
straight for the house.

"Now we're in for it," he thought. "From now on the question with Juliet
and me will be how we can most gracefully efface ourselves without seeming
to do it. If I remember this young person correctly she's a little
difficult to leave unchaperoned against her will."

Out of the corner of his eye he kept track of the approaching figure. It
was coming on at a great pace, and in the twilight could be seen looming
taller and taller as it crossed the road and turned in across the lawn,
making a short cut according to Barnes's own fashion, so that the coming
footsteps were noiseless, even to the moment when the figure reached the
porch itself.

"Now for it," thought Anthony, feeling as if the curtain were about to
ascend on the fourth act of a play, when the third had ended amidst all
possible excitement.

"I found the roses blooming just as they used to do, at the side of the
house"--Rachel's warm, contralto voice was answering a question from
Juliet--"only so untended. I think I shall have to come out again before I
begin my work, to look after them."

Anthony did not turn as the step he had been watching for sounded upon the
porch. To save his life he could not help keeping his eyes upon Rachel's
face. Rachel herself looked up with the air of the visitor who does not
know the guests of the house, and the expression Anthony saw upon her face
showed only the slightest possible surprise--certainly no other feeling.

Juliet rose. "Ah, Mr. Lockwood," she said, with a cordiality, sincere
little person though she was, Anthony knew for once she did not feel. "In
the dusk I couldn't be quite sure."

Lockwood's eyes instantly turned to Rachel. That he had known in some way
whom he was to see was evident from a most unusual agitation in his
manner.

"Mrs.--Huntington," he got out somehow, taking her hand, and staring
eagerly down into her face, "I heard you were home, and I hoped to find
you here. I--you are--I am extremely glad----"

* * * * *

Half an hour later Anthony came upon his wife in the darkness of the
dining-room. "Oh, you shouldn't have left them when I was away," she said