s that they had been kind to you at this young
man's place. We must ask him down here to dinner, Alice. Oh, and that
reminds me I found a letter from him to-day asking me to shoot. I don't
go in for that sort of thing, but you young fellows had better try it."

Mr. Stocks declined, said he had given it up. Mr. Thompson said,
"Upon my word I should like to," and privately vowed to forget the
invitation. He distrusted his prowess with a gun.

"By the by, was he not at the picnic when you saved my daughter's life?
I can never thank you enough, Stocks. What should I have done without
my small girl?"

"Yes, he was there. In fact he was with Miss Alice at the moment she
slipped."

He may not have meant it, but the imputation was clear, and it stirred
one fiery expostulation. "Oh, but he hadn't time before Mr. Stocks
came after me," she began, and then feeling it ungracious towards that
gentleman to make him share a possibility of heroism with another, she
was silent. More, a lurking fear which had never grown large enough for
a suspicion, began to catch at her heart. Was it possible that Lewis
had held back?

For a moment the candle-lit room vanished from her eyes. She saw the
warm ledge of rock with the rowan berries above. She saw his flushed,
eager face--it was her last memory before she had fallen. Surely
never--never was there cowardice in those eyes!

Mrs. Andrews's vulgarities and her husband's vain repetitions began to
pall upon the anxious girl. The young Mr. Thompson talked shrewdly
enough on things of business, and Mr. Stocks abated something of his
pomposity and was honestly amiable. These were her own people, the
workers for whom she had craved. And yet--were they so desirable? Her
father's grave, keen face pleased her always, but what of the others?
The radiant gentlewomen whom she had met with the Manorwaters seemed to
belong to another world than this of petty social struggling and awkward
ostentation. And the men! Doubtless they were foolish, dilettanti,
barbarians of sport, half-hearted and unpractical! And she shut her
heart to any voice which would defend them.

Lewis drove over to dine some four days later with dismal presentiments.
The same hopeless self-contempt which had hung over him for weeks was
still weighing on his soul. He dreaded the verdict of Alice's eyes, and
in a heart which held only kindness he looked for a cold criticism. It
was this despair which made his position hopeless He wou