pause. As if turning to quite another subject, Mrs. Toplady
remarked:

"You will have visitors at Rivenoak next week. Sir William Amys is to
be there for a day or two, and Lord Dymchurch--"

"Lord Dymchurch?"

The girl threw off her air of cold concentration, and shone
triumphantly.

"Does it surprise you, May?"

"Oh, I hadn't thought of it--I didn't know my aunt had invited him--"

"The wonder is that Lord Dymchurch should have accepted," said Mrs.
Toplady, with a very mature archness. "Did he know, by the bye, that
you were going down?"

"I fancy he did."

Their eyes met, and May relieved her feelings with a little laugh.

"Then perhaps the wonder ceases. And yet, in another way--" Mrs.
Toplady broke off, and added in a lower voice, "Of course you know all
about his circumstances?"

"No, in deed I don't. Tell me about him, please."

"But haven't you heard that he is the poorest man in the House of
Lords?"

"I had no idea of it," cried May. "How should I have known? Really? He
is so poor?"

"I imagine he has barely enough to live upon. The family was ruined
long ago."

"But why didn't you tell me? Does my aunt know?" May's voice did not
express resentment, nor, indeed, strong feeling of any kind. The
revelation seemed merely to surprise her. She was smiling, as if at the
amusingly unexpected.

"Lady Ogram certainly knows," said Mrs. Toplady.

"Then of course that's why he does nothing," May exclaimed. "Fancy!"
Her provincialism was becoming very marked. "A lord with hardly enough
to live upon! But I'm astonished that he seems so cheerful."

"Lord Dymchurch has a very philosophical mind," said the older lady,
with gravity humorously exaggerated.

"Yes, I suppose he has. Now I shall understand him better. I'm glad
he's going to be at Rivenoak. You know that he asked me to advise him
about what he should do. It'll be rather awkward, though. I must get
him to tell me the truth."

"You'll probably have no difficulty in that. It's pretty certain that
he thinks you know all about him already. If he hadn't, I feel sure he
wouldn't go to Rivenoak."

The girl mused, smiling self-consciously.

"I had better tell you the truth, Mrs. Toplady," were her next words,
in a burst of confidence. "I think Lord Dymchurch is very nice--as a
friend. But only as a friend."

"Thank you for your confidence, May. Do you know that I suspected
something of the kind."

"I want to be friends with him," pursued May,