But I believe in liking what
you _do_ like, and not being bullied into what you don't like."

"I suppose if one studies these things----" Elsie French began timidly.

"What's the good of studying!" cried Lady Barnes; "one has one's own
taste, or one hasn't."

Confronted with this form of the Absolute, Elsie French looked
perplexed; especially as her own artistic sympathies were mainly with
Daphne. The situation was certainly awkward. At the time of the Barnes's
financial crash, and Sir Edward Barnes's death, Heston Park, which
belonged to Lady Barnes, was all that remained to her and her son. A
park of a hundred acres and a few cottages went with the house; but
there was no estate to support it, and it had to be let, to provide an
income for the widow and the boy. Much of the expensive furniture had
been sold before letting, but enough remained to satisfy the wants of a
not very exacting tenant.

Lady Barnes had then departed to weep in exile on a pittance of about
seven hundred a year. But with the marriage of her son to Miss Floyd and
her millions, the mother's thoughts had turned fondly back to Heston
Park. It was too big for her, of course; but the young people clearly
must redeem it, and settle there. And Daphne had been quite amenable.
The photographs charmed her. The house, she said, was evidently in a
pure style, and it would be a delight to make it habitable again. The
tenant, however, had a lease, and refused to turn out until at last
Daphne had frankly bribed him to go. And now, after three years of
married life, during which the young couple had rented various "places,"
besides their house in London and a villa at Tunis, Heston Park had been
vacated, Daphne and Roger had descended upon it as Lady Barnes's tenants
at a high rent, intent upon its restoration; and Roger's mother had been
invited to their councils.

Hence, indeed, these tears. When Daphne first stepped inside the
ancestral mansion of the Trescoes--such had been Lady Barnes's maiden
name--she had received a severe shock. The outside, the shell of the
house--delightful! But inside!--heavens! what taste, what
decoration--what ruin of a beautiful thing! Half the old mantelpieces
gone, the ceilings spoiled, the decorations "busy," pretentious,
overdone, and nothing left to console her but an ugly row of bad Lelys
and worse Highmores--the most despicable collection of family portraits
she had ever set eyes upon!

Roger had looked unhappy. "It