room.

"Wullie," she said, sternly, "you've no more sense than a child, and
if it was not for me you'd have been in your coffin these five years.
Go up-stairs this minute and change your boots." And off she sent him,
but not without a parting shot from Miss Springle.

"Mind you put on a blue velvet smoking-suit, Mr. Dodd, dear. I do
love gentlemen in smoking-suits," she said, giggling.

Tea was a terrible function. Oh, the difference to the merry tea at
Harley!

Lady Wakely, sleepily knitting and addressing an occasional
observation to her neighbor; the rest of the women silent as the
grave, except Miss Springle and Mrs. Dodd, who sparred together like
two cats.

The men could talk of nothing but the war news which had come by the
afternoon post.

There was a gloom over the whole party. How on earth was I to escape
from the oppression? They were not people of the world, who would be
accustomed to each person doing what they pleased. They expected to be
entertained all the time. To get away from them for a moment I would
be obliged to invent some elaborate excuse.

Antony had not appeared upon the scene, or Augustus, either.

At last--at last Lady Wakely put her knitting in a bag and made a move
towards the door.

"I shall rest now," she said, in her fat, kind voice, and I
accompanied her from the room, leaving the rest of my guests to take
care of themselves. I felt I should throw the cups at their heads if
I stayed any longer.

There, in the hall, was Antony, quietly reading the papers. His
dark-blue and black silk smoking-suit was extraordinarily becoming. He
looked like a person from another planet after the people I had left
in the drawing-room.

He rose as we passed him.

"Some very interesting South African news," he said, addressing me,
and while I stopped to answer him Lady Wakely went up the stairs
alone.

"The draughts are dreadful here again, Comtesse," he said,
plaintively.

"Why did you not go into the library, then," I said, "or the
billiard-room, or one of the drawing-rooms?"

"I thought perhaps you might pass this way and would give me your
advice as to which room to choose."

I laughed. "The library, then, I suggest," and I started as if to go
up the stairs.

"Comtesse! You would not leave me all alone, would you? You have not
told me half enough about our ancestors yet."

"Oh, I am tired of the ancestors!" and I mounted one step and looked
back.

"I thought perhaps you wou