downstairs, to see about
securing theatre tickets, whereupon his wife heaved a sigh of relief,
and helped herself to a fresh cup of tea.

"Thank goodness! I ken't stand men in the daytime. They don't take any
interest in clothes or parcels, or trying-on, but kinder hang round,
looking bored and superior! It gets on my nerves. ... That was a real
smart-looking man you had with you to-day, dear. Guest? did you say--
Captain Guest? English, isn't he? Acts as though he'd got the patent,
and everybody else was imitation. I rather like it myself, I don't
think anything of a man who takes a back seat." The short, impatient
little sigh was evidently dedicated to the memory of the absent Silas.
... "Where did you pick him up, dear? He seems very devoted. Anything
coming on between you?"

Cornelia's "No!" made the listener start in her seat, so loud was it, so
stern, so eloquent of displeasure. She herself was astonished at the
white heat of anger which possessed her as she listened to Mrs
Moffatt's questionings. "Picked him up," indeed! What insolence; what
vulgarity! What an indignity to speak of him in such words. Her
indignation seemed almost as much on Guest's account as her own. A
vision of his face rose before her, she seemed to see the curl of the
lip, the droop of the eyelid with which he would have greeted such an
expression.

"No! Suttenly not! He is the merest acquaintance. There is not even
an ordinary friendship between us. I may very probably never meet him
again."

"Is that so?" queried Mrs Moffatt, calmly. As the Captain had himself
announced his intention of calling at the hotel, the only effect of
Cornelia's violence was to deepen the impression that there was
"something in it," but she was too diplomatic to pursue the subject.
Instead, she prattled on about a dozen inconsequent topics, and finally
suggested a drive in the Park before dinner.

"It will freshen you up after your journey, and there's nothing else to
do for the next two hours. Just ring, will you, dear, and make
arrangements, while I write a few notes in my room. A victoria, or a
motor, whichever you prefer, and in about half-an-hour. That will give
us time to prink." She rustled out of the room, and Cornelia rang and
gave the order, only too thankful to avoid a prolonged _tete-a-tete_
indoors. Once again she wondered how it had come to pass that she had
become on intimate terms with this woman, who now jarred upo