ardon did not need to rise from her seat and fetch Burke: it
lay always close at hand. She merely lifted it on to her knee and ran
her finger down the names beginning with B-e-a.

"Beaton, Beare, Beatty, Beale--" she read out, and she shook her head
in dismal triumph; "but never a Bean! No! we English have no such
dreadful names, thank Heavens!"

"This is the beginning of April," pursued Mrs. de Tracy, referring to
a date-card. "Maria Spalding's course at Nauheim will take three
weeks. We must allow her a week for going and coming. During that time
Mrs. David Loring can be my guest."

"A whole month!" cried the companion, as though in ecstasy at her
employer's generosity. "A whole month at Stoke Revel!"

Mrs. de Tracy took no notice. "Write in my name to Maria Spalding,
please," she commanded. "Be sure that there is no mistake about dates.
Mention the departure and arrival of trains, and say that Mrs. David
Loring will find a fly at the station. That is all, I think."

The companion bent officiously forward. "You remember, of course, that
young Mr. Lavendar comes down next week upon business?"

"Well, what if he does?" asked Mrs. de Tracy shortly.

"Mrs. David Loring is a widow," murmured the companion darkly; "a
young American widow; and they are said to be so dangerous!"

Mrs. de Tracy drew herself up. "Do you insinuate that the Admiral's
niece will lay herself out to attract Mr. Lavendar, a widow in the
house of a widow! You go rather too far, Miss Smeardon, though you are
speaking of an American. Besides, allusions of this character are
extremely distasteful to me. I have been told that the minds of
unmarried women are always running upon love affairs, but I should
hardly have thought it of you."

"I'm sure I never imagined any about myself!" murmured Miss Smeardon
with the pitiable writhe of the trodden-on worm.

"I should suppose not," rejoined Mrs. de Tracy gravely, and the
companion took up her pen obediently to write to Maria Spalding.

"Shall I send your love to the Admiral's niece?" she humbly enquired,
"or--or something of the kind?" There was irony in the last phrase,
but it was quite unconscious.

"Not my love," replied Mrs. de Tracy, "some suitable message. Make no
mistake about the dates, remember."

Thus a letter containing dates, and though not love, the substitute
described by Miss Smeardon as "something of the kind" for an unwanted
niece from an unknown aunt, left Stoke Revel by the af