hastily laid a hand on him with, "Keep the
field, Harry; don't go."

"I'm not going."

"That's right. Face it out before the hags. Whom shall I introduce
you--There's Birdie Stympson--come."

"No, no; I don't mean to dance again."

"Why not? Beard the harpies like a man. Dancing would refute them
all."

"Would it?" gravely said Harold.

Nor could he be persuaded, save once at his host's bidding, but showed
no signs of being abashed or distressed, and most of the male Stympsons
came and spoke to him. The whole broke up at three, and we repaired to
our rooms, conscious that family prayers would take place as the clock
struck nine as punctually as if nothing had happened, and that our
characters depended on our punctuality. Viola was in time, and so was
Eustace; I sneaked in late and ashamed; and the moment the servants had
filed out Viola sprang to Eustace with vehement acknowledgments; and it
appeared that just before she came down her missing box of gifts had
been brought to her room, and she was told that Mr. Alison had sent for
them. Eustace smirked, and Lady Diana apologised for her little
daughter's giddy, exaggerated expressions, by which she had given far
more trouble than she ever intended.

"No trouble," said Eustace. "Harold always wants to work off his
steam."

"What, it was he?" said Viola.

"Yes, of course; he always does those things," said Eustace, speaking
with a tone of proprietorship, as if Harold had been a splendid
self-acting steam-engine. "I am very glad to have gratified you, Miss
Tracy--"

"Only he did, and not you," said Viola, boldly, luckily without being
heard by her mother, while Eustace murmured out, rather bewildered, "It
is all the same."

Viola evidently did not think so when Harold came in with beads of wet
fringing his whiskers, though he had divested himself of the chief
evidences of the rivers of muddy lane through which he had walked to
Arked House, full four miles off.

Viola's profuse thanks were crossed by Lady Diana's curt apologies; and
as poor Piggy, who had genuinely overslept himself, entered with his
apologies--poor fellow--in a voice very much as if he was trying to say
"Grumph, grumph," while he could only say "Wee, wee," they were
received solemnly by his uncle with, "The antipodes are a rebuke to
you, Pigou. I am afraid the young men of this hemisphere have no
disposition to emulate either such chivalrous attentions or exertions
as have been