"Raeburn! Erica Raeburn!" thought Mr. Cuthbert to himself. "Uncommon
name in England. Connection, I wonder! Aunt hadn't given her name! That
looks odd. I'll see if she has a Scotch accent."

"Are you staying in Greyshot?" he asked as they went down the broad
staircase, with its double border of flowering plants.

"Yes," said Erica; "I came last week. What lovely country it is about
here!"

"Country," with its thrilled "r," betrayed her nationality, though her
accent was of the slightest. Mr. Cuthbert chuckled to himself, for he
thought he had caught Mrs. Fane-Smith tripping, and he was a man
who derived an immense amount of pleasure from making other people
uncomfortable. As a child, he had been a tease; as a big boy, he had
been a bully; as a man, he had become a malicious gossip monger. Tonight
he thought he saw a chance of good sport, and directly he had said
grace, in the momentary pause which usually follows, he turned to Erica
with an abrupt, though outwardly courteous question, carried off with a
little laugh.

"I hope you are no relation to that despicable infidel who bears your
name, Miss Raeburn?"

Erica's color deepened; she almost annihilated him with a flash from her
bright indignant eyes.

"I am Luke Raeburn's daughter," she said, in her clearest voice, and
with a dignity which, for the time, spoiled Mr. Cuthbert's enjoyment.

Many people had heard the vicar's question during the pause, and not
a few listened curiously for the answer which, though quietly spoken,
reached many ears, for nothing gives so much penetrating power to words
as concentrated will and keen indignation. Before long every one in the
room knew that Mrs. Fane-Smith's pretty niece was actually the daughter
of "that evil and notorious Raeburn."

Mr. Cuthbert had certainly got his malicious wish; he had succeeded
in making Mrs. Fane-Smith miserable, in making his hostess furious, in
putting his little neighbor into the most uncomfortable of positions. Of
course he was not going to demean himself by talking to "that atheist's
daughter." He enjoyed the general discomfiture to his heart's content,
and then devoted himself to the lady on his other side.

As for Erica her blood was up. Forced to sit still, forced even to eat
at a table where she was an unwelcome guest, her anger got the mastery
of her for the time. She was indignant at the insult to her father,
indignant, too, that her aunt had ever allowed her to get into such a