owl from Jock's corner, where he
was blushing in the firelight. "It's because you were once a fellow
yourself, and know all about it."

"So it is, Jock; you are right, as usual," said Sir Tom; "I was once a
fellow myself, and now I'm an old fellow, and growing duller. Turn out
your basket of eggs, Aunt Randolph, and let us know what is going on.
Where did you come from last--the Mulberrys? Come; there must have been
some pretty pickings of gossip there."

"You shall have it all in good time. I am not going to run myself dry
the first hour. I want to know about yourselves, and when you are going
to give up this honeymooning. I expected to have met all sorts of people
here."

"Yes," said Sir Tom, and then he burst forth in a laugh, "La
Forno-Populo and a few others; but as little Tom is not quite up to
visitors, we have put them off till Easter."

"La Forno-Populo!" said Lady Randolph, in a voice of dismay.

"Why not?" said Sir Tom. "She wrote and offered herself. I thought she
might find it a doubtful pleasure, but if she likes it---- However, you
may make yourself easy, nobody is coming," he added, with a certain jar
of impatience in his tone.

"Well, Tom, I must say I am very glad of that," Lady Randolph said
gravely--and then there was a pause. "I doubt whether Lucy would have
liked her," she added, after a moment. Then with another interval, "I
think, Lucy, my love, after that nice cup of tea, and my first sight of
you, that I will go to my own room. I like a little rest before
dinner--you know my lazy way."

"And it's getting ridiculously dark in this room," Sir Tom said, kicking
a footstool out of the way. This little impatient movement was like one
of those expletives that seem to relieve a man's mind, and both the
ladies understood it as such, and knew that he was angry. Lucy, as she
rose from her tea-table to attend upon her visitor, herself in a
confused and painful mood, and vexed with what had been said to her,
thought her husband was irritated by his aunt, and felt much sympathy
with him, and anxiety to conduct Lady Randolph to her room before it
should go any farther. But the elder lady understood it very
differently. She went away, followed by Lucy through the great
drawing-room, where a solitary lamp had been placed on a table to show
the way. It had been the Dowager's own house in her day, and she did not
require any guidance to her room. Nor did she detain Lucy after the
conventional visit to s