lop of themselves, he
would have, at any rate, been less self-conscious. But he could not
let it alone. He had met Auckland society often enough and had,
indeed, during his later years, been something of a society man, but
there everything was straight-forward and simple. There was no
tradition, no convention, no standard. Because other people did a
thing was no reason why you should do it--originality was welcomed
rather than otherwise. But here there were so many things that you
must do, and so very, very many that you mustn't; and if you were a
Trojan, matters were still more complicated.

It was after half-past four when he entered the drawing-room, and Clare
was pouring out tea. Five or six ladies were already there, and a
clergyman of ample proportions and quite beautifully brushed hair. He
was introduced--"Mrs. le Terry--Miss Ponsonby--Miss Lucy Ponsonby--Miss
Werrel--Miss Thisbe Werrel--Mr. Carrell--our rector, Harry."

He shook hands and was terribly embarrassed. He was conscious at once
of that same sense of challenge that he had felt with Barbour in the
morning. They were not obviously staring, but he knew that they were
rapidly summing him up. He coloured foolishly, and stood for a moment
awkwardly in the middle of the room.

"Tea, Harry?" said Clare. "Scones down by the fire. Everybody else is
all right--so look after yourself."

He found himself by Mrs. le Terry, a small, rather pretty woman with
wide-open blue eyes, and a mass of dark brown hair hidden beneath a
large black hat that drooped over one ear. She talked rapidly and with
few pauses. She was, he discovered, one of those persons whose
conversation was a series of exclamation marks. She was perpetually
astonished, delighted, and disappointed with an amount of emotion that
left her no breath and gave her hearers a small opinion of her
sincerity. "It's too terribly funny," she said, opening her eyes very
wide indeed, "that you should have been in that amazing place, New
Zealand--all sheep and Maories, isn't it?--and if there's one thing
that I should be likely to detest more than mutton I'm sure it would be
Maories. Too dreadful and terrible! But you look splendidly well, Mr.
Trojan. I never, really never, saw any one with such a magnificent
colour! I suppose that it's that gorgeous sun, and it never rains,
does it? Too delightful! If there's one thing that I _do_ adore, it's
the sun!"

"Well, I don't know about that," sa