e room, remarking on everything.

"Well, there! What do you say to _that_ for a picture," addressing his
wife. "Tell Ma to come here, Eleanor, I want 'er to see this 'orse,
and the lady on the moon in the next frame. I wish you could paint
pictures, my girl; but maybe Mr. Roche will 'ave you taught."

Giddy flushes scarlet. Lady MacDonald fans herself violently with the
screen. Mrs. Grebby takes the tiny cup Eleanor hands her, and turns it
round to examine it. Then her eyes fall on the slices of thin bread
and butter, the dainty biscuits, and minute squares of buttered toast.

"Don't you get 'ungry, dearie?" she asks. "I thought you'd be sure to
have a knife-and-fork tea, living in this style."

Her daughter laughs heartily. A wicked desire to shock Lady MacDonald,
as Giddy has so often excited her to do on previous occasions, seizes
Eleanor.

"Oh, _no_, Ma! We have big dinners at eight o'clock. Five courses and
serviettes. You ask Lady MacDonald."

"I don't call this a cup," declares Mr. Grebby, grinning broadly as
Eleanor hands him his tea. "It's more like an acorn!" He takes half a
dozen slices of bread and butter and munches them hungrily.

"I'm a bit peckish, my girl," he says. "But then we've had a long day,
and fastin' don't agree with me. We went to the Tower, Madame
Tussaud's, and the Exhibition of Tortures in Leicester Square. We
liked that best of all."

"But what did you do with Rover?" asks Eleanor, exciting the dog to
jump on the sofa and patting his wet nose.

"We left him at Cousin Harriett's. We can stay the night here with
you, and after that we are going to put up a bit at her lodging-house
in Bloomsbury. Ma was set on bringing old Rover to see you, as we
think he won't last long now."

"The dear fellow!" murmurs Eleanor, cutting the pink cake. "Some more
tea, Lady MacDonald?"

"_No_, thank you," and the severity of the tone startles Eleanor.

She fears she has committed some deadly offence in offering this proud
beauty a second cup. Never was there a more grotesque tea-party on the
terrace than in Eleanor's boudoir that afternoon. Giddy with deepest
shame, resentment and horror, raging in her heart. Lady MacDonald
haughty and disdainful, eyeing the homely couple as she would the
beasts at the Zoo. Mrs. Grebby, speechless in admiring silence,
fingering the frills of the sofa cushions, and taking in the pattern of
the wall-paper, her breast swelling with pride and g