onechurch. It took a little over fifteen
minutes to walk down from Brineweald to the beach at Stonechurch, and
perhaps a little over twenty minutes to walk back up the steep hill. Sir
Joseph's place, Brineweald Park, lay inland on the far side of the
village of Brineweald, about a mile from "The Fastness," but the
distance was soon covered by the young people, even when they could not
dispose of one of Sir Joseph's cars; and the two households were
therefore practically always mingled.

Bathing, tennis, golf, picnicking, croquet,--these helped to fill the
time while the sun was high; and when the cool of the evening came, the
quiet paths and groves of Brineweald Park, or the bowers of Mrs.
Delarayne's garden, were an agreeable refuge for bodies pleasantly
fatigued and faintly langorous.

Mrs. Delarayne who was not uncommonly in a condition of faint languor
was content, during these terrible six weeks of her life, to play the
part of spectator. Silently, but with a good proportion of the available
interest, she contemplated the younger members of the party, and whether
she happened to be on her _chaise-longue_ overlooking her own lawn, or
on the terrace of Brineweald Park, her deep concern about the
performances of her juniors never abated. The fact that a good deal of
this determined attention was calculated to ward off the less attractive
alternative of Sir Joseph's untiring advances, was suspected least of
all by the generous squire of Brineweald himself; but it was noticeable
too, that she would often sit for long spells neither observing the
pranks of her young people nor listening to Sir Joseph's dulcet tones,
and then it was that her daughters would suspect that age was after all
beginning to tell, even in the case of their valiant parent. At such
times she was, of course, simply dreaming day dreams of the life she
could have had if, as "he" had said, she had been twenty now; and the
beatific expression that would come into her face was scarcely one of
reconciliation to senility.

To say that Vanessa Vollenberg and Agatha Fearwell were perfectly happy
on this holiday, would be a little wide of the mark. Indeed their
condition fell very much more short of perfect happiness than they
could possibly have anticipated.

Truth to tell, Leonetta was too indisputably mistress of the stage. The
infinite resource with which she contrived always to draw the limelight in
her direction, the unremitting regularity with whic