in spite of her mirth. "Well, I don't want you to
have anything to do with it. That's _my_ affair. But, about this
concert,"--she leans towards him, resting her hand on the edge of the
carriage. "Do you think one should go _nowhere_ when wearing black?"

"I think one should do just as one feels," says the professor nervously.

"I wonder if one should _say_ just what one feels," says she. She draws
back haughtily, then wrath gets the better of dignity, and she breaks
out again. "What a _horrid_ answer! _You_ are unfeeling if you like!"

"_I_ am?"

"Yes, yes! You would deny me this small gratification, you would lock me
up forever with Aunt Jane, you would debar me from everything! Oh!" her
lips trembling, "how I wish--I _wish_--guardians had never been
invented."

The professor almost begins to wish the same. Almost--perhaps not quite!
That accusation about wishing to keep her locked up forever with Miss
Majendie is so manifestly unjust that he takes it hardly. Has he not
spent all this past week striving to open a way of escape for her from
the home she so detests! But, after all, how could she know that?

"You have misunderstood me," says he calmly, gravely. "Far from wishing
you to deny yourself this concert, I am glad--glad from my _heart_--that
you are going to it--that some small pleasure has fallen into your life.
Your aunt's home is an unhappy one for you, I know, but you should
remember that even if--if you have got to stay with her until you become
your own mistress, still that will not be forever."

"No, I shall not stay there forever," says she slowly. "And so--you
really think----" she is looking very earnestly at him.

"I do, indeed. Go out--go everywhere--enjoy yourself, child, while you
can."

He lifts his hat and walks away.

"Who was that, dear?" asks Mrs. Constans, a pretty pale woman, rushing
out of the shop and into the carriage.

"My guardian--Mr. Curzon."

"Ah!" glancing carelessly after the professor's retreating figure. "A
youngish man?"

"No, old," says Perpetua, "at least I think--do you know," laughing,
"when he's _gone_ I sometimes think of him as being pretty young, but
when he is _with_ me, he is old--old and grave!"

"As a guardian should be, with such a pretty ward," says Mrs. Constans,
smiling. "His back looks young, however."

"And his laugh _sounds_ young."

"Ah! he can laugh then?"

"Very seldom. Too seldom. But when he does, it is a nice laugh. But he
wears spe