of the sunlight
to meet her own, many things might have been different. But the moment
came--and the moment passed.

Riding quickly up the avenue, she drew rein at the hall door; and at
the same instant Lady Frances Hope crossed the wide sunny hall.

Clodagh saw her at once, and a shade of disappointment touched her
face. Lady Frances was so intensely suggestive of the world she had
been trying to forget. Her impulses of a minute ago shrank
instinctively; the habit of indifference came back to her by
suggestion. She suddenly felt ashamed of her sunburned face and of the
spray of honeysuckle.

But Lady Frances came forward to the hall door, and at the same moment
a groom hurried round from the stables.

Clodagh slipped easily from her horse; took her flowers from the
saddle; and then turned to greet her friend.

"How are you?" she said. "I was so sorry not to have seen you this
morning. I have had a glorious ride."

Lady Frances did not respond to the words with her habitual smile. And,
on closer scrutiny, Clodagh observed that, despite a very careful
toilet, she looked tired and annoyed.

"You've been away an age," she said irritably. "It's after twelve."

"Then perhaps I'd better change. The coach is to be back from the
station at half-past twelve."

"No. Never mind! Diana isn't conventional. You can meet the people--and
lunch too--in your habit. I want to talk to you."

Clodagh's eyes opened. It was new to find Lady Frances's manner either
hasty or perturbed.

"To me? What about?"

The other hesitated for a moment, then looked straight at her
companion.

"About Walter Gore."

The onslaught was so sudden that Clodagh had no time to guard her
feelings. She flushed--a deep, painful flush, that spread over her
cheeks, her ears, her forehead.

Lady Frances looked at her mercilessly.

"I have been worrying so about his coming--worrying so about you."

"About me?"

Clodagh said the words consciously and uncomfortably.

"Yes. I feel so much for you--you, who are so sensitive. Clodagh!"--she
laid her fingers lightly on Clodagh's arm--"Clodagh! I am your best
friend. You believe that?"

"You--you have always been very good to me."

"And always _shall_ be good to you. Look here!" Her voice suddenly took
on the tone of seeming frankness that is the clever woman's best
weapon. "I'm enormously fond of you--enormously fond of you. I should
hate to see you hurt or--or----"

She paused judiciously.

"B