pose, Mr Grey, you and I, when we next meet, will be far
too distant to fight with each other."

"I hope that may never be the case," said Mr Grey.

"I suppose nothing would prevent his fighting; would it Alice? But,
remember, there must be no fighting when we do meet next, and that
must be in September."

"With all my heart," said Mr Grey. But Alice said nothing.

Then Mr Palliser made his little speech. "Alice," he said, as he gave
his hand to Miss Vavasor, "give my compliments to your father, and
tell him that I shall take the liberty of asking him to come down to
Matching for the early shooting in September, and that I shall expect
him to bring you with him. You may tell him also that he will have
to stay to see you off, but that he will not be allowed to take you
away." Lady Glencora thought that this was very pretty as coming from
her husband, and so she told him on their way home.

Alice insisted on going to Queen Anne Street in a cab by herself.
Mr Palliser had offered a carriage, and Mr Grey, of course, offered
himself as a protector; but she would have neither the one nor the
other. If he had gone with her he might by chance have met her
father, and she was most anxious that she should not be encumbered
by her lover's presence when she first received her father's
congratulations. They had slept at Dover, and had come up by a
mid-day train. When she reached Queen Anne Street, the house was
desolate, and she might therefore have allowed Mr Grey to attend her.
But she found a letter waiting for her which made her for the moment
forget both him and her father. Lady Macleod, at Cheltenham, was very
ill, and wished to see her niece, as she said, before she died. "I
have got your letter," said the kind old woman, "and am now quite
happy. It only wanted that to reconcile me to my departure. I thought
through it all that my girl would be happy at last. Will she forgive
me if I say that I have forgiven her?" The letter then went on to beg
Alice to come to Cheltenham at once. "It is not that I am dying now,"
said Lady Macleod, "though you will find me much altered and keeping
my bed. But the doctor says he fears the first cold weather. I know
what that means, my dear; and if I don't see you now, before your
marriage, I shall never see you again. Pray get married as soon as
you can. I want to know that you are Mrs Grey before I go. If I were
to hear that it was postponed because of my illness, I think it would
kill