ng round about. As she sat at the table she added to
her prayer the supplication that the dear old house might not be burned
down.

Soon afterwards she went down stairs, and on the lower flight paused, to
listen to voices--not those of her mother and Iden--creditors,
doubtless, come to cry aloud, "Pay me that thou owest!"--the very sum
and total of religion. Her heart beat quicker--the voices came again,
and she thought she recognized them, and that they were not those of
creditors. She entered the sitting-room, and found that two visitors,
from widely separated places, had arrived; one with a portmanteau, the
other with an old, many-coloured carpet-bag. They were Amadis Iden, from
Iden Court, over the Downs, the Court Idens, as they were called, and
Alere Flamma, from London; the Flammas were carpet-bag people.

Her father was making them very welcome, after his wont, and they were
talking of the house the Idens of yore had built in a lonely spot,
expressly in order that they might drink, drink, drink undisturbed by
their unreasonable wives.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XXVI.

THEY talked on and on, these three, Iden, Amadis Iden, and Alere Flamma,
with Amaryllis listening, from the end of April till near the end of
May; till "a month passed away," and still they were talking. For there
is nothing so good to the human heart as well agreed conversation, when
you know that your companion will answer to your thought as the anvil
meets the hammer, ringing sound to merry stroke; better than wine,
better than sleep, like love itself--for love is agreement of
thought--"God listens to those who pray to him; let us eat and drink,
and think of nothing," says the Arabian proverb. So they ate and
drank--very moderate the drinking--and thought of nothing, and talked,
which should be added to complete felicity. Not, of course, all of them
always together, sometimes all four, sometimes Alere, Amadis, and
Amaryllis, sometimes only the last two.

The round summer-house was their Parliament House whenever the east
winds sank and the flowers shone forth like sunshine; as the sun shines
when the clouds withdraw, so when the harsh east winds cease the May
flowers immediately bloom and glow.

It was a large round house, properly builded of brick, as a summer-house
should be--put not thy faith in lath work--and therefore dry and warm;
to sit in it was like sitting in a shell, warm and comfortable, with a