ead together for an hour or so every day. I thought it
would be a nice little change for Bob, and it was quite a chance; he
must do a certain amount of work, you see. Well, they only went at the
beginning of the month, and already they have had enough of each other's
society."

"You don't mean that they've had a row?"

Catherine inclined a mortified head.

"Bob never had such a thing in his life before, nor did I ever know
anybody who succeeded in having one with Bob. It does take two, you
know. And when one of the two has an angelic temper, and tact enough for
twenty--"

"You naturally blame the other," I put in, as she paused in visible
perplexity.

"But I don't, Duncan, and that's just the point. George is devoted to
Bob, and is as nice as he can be himself, in his own sober, honest,
plodding way. He may not have the temper, he certainly has not the tact,
but he worships Bob and has come back quite miserable."

"Then he has come back, and you have seen him?"

"He was here last night. You must know that Bob writes to me every day,
even from Cambridge, if it's only a line; and in yesterday's letter he
mentioned quite casually that George had had enough of it and was off
home. It was a little too casual to be quite natural in old Bob, and
there are other things he has been mentioning in the same way. If any
instinct is to be relied upon it is a mother's, and mine amounted almost
to second sight. I sent Master George a telegram, and he came in last
night."

"Well?"'

"Not a word! There was bad blood between them, but that was all I could
get out of him. Vulgar disagreeables between Bob, of all people, and his
greatest friend! If you could have seen the poor fellow sitting where
you are sitting now, like a prisoner in the dock! I put him in the
witness-box instead, and examined him on scraps of Bob's letters to me.
It was as unscrupulous as you please, but I felt unscrupulous; and the
poor dear was too loyal to admit, yet too honest to deny, a single
thing."

"And?" said I, as Bob's mother paused again.

"And," cried she, with conscious melodrama in the fiery twinkle of her
eye--"and, I know all! There is an odious creature at the hotel--a
widow, if you please! A 'ripping widow' Bob called her in his first
letter; then it was 'Mrs. Lascelles'; but now it is only 'some people'
whom he escorts here, there, and everywhere. _Some_ people, indeed!"

Catherine smiled unmercifully. I relied upon my nod.

"I nee