ut who would hurt me? Why should I be hurt?"

"You _shouldn't_ be, of course. But sometimes circumstances--chances
--people--hurt one. Oh, my dear girl, I'm unhappy at this unlucky
coming of Walter's. It's hard--it's really hard--on you."

As the words were uttered, it seemed to Clodagh that a faint cold wind
blew from some unseen quarter, chilling the summer warmth--chilling her
own happiness.

"Why--why hard on me?" she asked.

"Dear child!" Lady Frances's tone was deep and kind. "Do you remember
the night in town when you asked me to take you to the Tamperleigh's
party?"

"Yes. I remember."

"You remember why I refused?"

"Yes, I remember."

"But you did not know my full reason for refusing. I had met Walter a
day or two before. We had discussed you."

"And what had Sir Walter Gore to say of me?"

"He said--oh, dear child, don't ask me to be too literal."

"But I do."

Clodagh freed her arm.

"Is it worth while? I tried to keep you two apart while I could. Now
that it has become impossible----"

"But why should we be kept apart? What have I done?"

"Dear Clodagh! you know Walter--you know how entirely he
disapproves----"

"Disapproves!--disapproves! What right has Sir Walter Gore to
disapprove of me?--to criticise--to speak of me?"

Her voice shook, not--as she herself imagined--with outraged pride, but
with uncontrollable disappointment and pain.

"Oh, I resent it!" she cried--"I resent it!"

Then suddenly she paused, turning to her companion with an almost
frightened gesture. Up the long avenue came the sound of wheels and the
rapid clatter of many hoofs.

Lady Frances put out her hand again, and touched Clodagh's wrist.

"Here they are!" she said. "I am glad to see your courage. I admire
it."

As she had intended, the sharp concise words braced her companion. She
stood for an instant longer in an attitude of nervous panic; then
suddenly she threw up her head with a touch of the boyish spirit that
had marked her long ago.

"I--I am not a coward, Lady Frances!" she said.

Side by side they waited, while the big yellow coach, piloted by George
Tuffnell, swung round the bend of the drive. And as Clodagh stood
there, watching the great vehicle sweep round to the hall door, her
face became pale and her fingers closed tightly round the handle of her
riding crop. It was her world--her world in miniature--that swayed
towards her, while she impotently waited its approach!

On the box, besi