his Heathcroft
man will have some sort of--of a fight or somethin'. That would be
awful, wouldn't it!"

I did not answer. My apprehensions were not on Herbert Bayliss's
account. He could look out for himself. It was Frances' happiness I was
thinking of.

"Hosy," said Hephzy, very seriously indeed, "there's somethin' else. I'm
not sure that Mr. Heathcroft is serious at all. Somethin' Mrs. Bayliss
said to me makes me feel a little mite anxious. She said Carleton
Heathcroft was a great lady's man. She told me some things about him
that--that--Well, I wish Frances wasn't so friendly with him, that's
all."

I shrugged my shoulders, pretending more indifference than I felt.

"She's a sensible girl," said I. "She doesn't need a guardian."

"I know, but--but he's way up in society, Lady Carey's heir and all
that. She can't help bein' flattered by his attentions to her. Any girl
would be, especially an English girl that thinks as much of class and
all that as they do over here and as she does. I wish I knew how she did
feel toward him."

"Why don't you ask her?"

Hephzy shook her head. "I wouldn't dare," she said. "She'd take my head
off. We're on awful thin ice, you and I, with her, as it is. She treats
us real nicely now, but that's because we don't interfere. If I should
try just once to tell her what she ought to do she'd flare up like a
bonfire. And then do the other thing to show her independence."

"I suppose she would," I admitted, gloomily.

"I know she would. No, we mustn't say anything to her. But--but you
might say somethin' to him, mightn't you. Just hint around and find
out what he does mean by bein' with her so much. Couldn't you do that,
Hosy?"

I smiled. "Possibly I could, but I sha'n't," I answered. "He would tell
me to go to perdition, probably, and I shouldn't blame him."

"Why no, he wouldn't. He thinks you're her uncle, her guardian, you
know. You'd have a right to do it."

I did not propose to exercise that right, and I said so, emphatically.
And yet, before that week was ended, I did do what amounted to that very
thing. The reason which led to this rash act on my part was a talk I had
with Lady Kent Carey.

I met her ladyship on the putting green of the ninth hole of the golf
course. I was playing a round alone. She came strolling over the green,
dressed as mannishly as usual, but carrying a very feminine parasol,
which by comparison with the rest of her get-up, looked as out of place
as