e
tomorrow. Will you come to lunch, or afterwards?"

"Afterwards, I think. We will be down at the club landing stage at
half-past two."

"Bertha is bent upon taking possession of you tomorrow," Lady
Greendale said, smiling, as the girl turned away; "and I shall be
glad for her to have a quiet two or three hours out of the racket.
A large party is very fatiguing, and I think that it has been too
much for her. Yesterday and today she has been quite unlike
herself; at one time sitting quiet and saying nothing, at other
times rattling away with Miss Haverley and Lady Olive, and
absolutely talking down both of them, which I should have thought
impossible. She seems to me to be altogether over-excited. I
thought it would have been a rest for her to get away for a week
from the fag in London, but I am sorry now that we came down
altogether. I am a little worried about it, Frank."

"Well, the season is drawing towards its end now, Lady Greendale,
and if you can get a short time at home no doubt it will do you
good. I did not think that Bertha was looking well when I saw her
yesterday."

Frank danced a couple more dances, and then went to Lady Greendale
and said:

"Will you make my excuses to Bertha? and tell her that, having
shown myself here, so that it might not be thought that I was out
of temper at my bad luck, I shall be off. Indeed, I do not feel
quite up to entering into the thing. You can understand, dear Lady
Greendale, that at present things are going rather hardly with me."

She gave him a sympathetic look. "I can understand, Frank," she
said; "but here she comes. You can make your excuses yourself."

"I can quite understand that you don't care about staying," Bertha
said, when he repeated what he had said to her mother. "Well, I
will give you the next dance, or, what will be nicer, I will sit it
out with you. Ah, here is my partner.

"I am afraid I have made a mistake, Mr. Jennings, and have got my
card mixed up. Do you mind taking the thirteenth dance instead of
this? I shall be very much obliged if you will."

Her partner murmured his assent.

"Thank you," Frank said, as she took his arm. "Now, shall we go out
on the balcony, or on the lawn?"

"The lawn, I think. It is a lovely evening, and there is no fear of
catching cold.

"I am afraid that you are very disappointed," she went on, as they
went out. "I am disappointed, too. I told you I wanted the best
yacht to win, and it has not done so."