lled his airy
castle incontinently about his ears.

This was the way of it.

It was that soft insidious hour which begins when it is time to dress
for dinner and ends in horrified exclamation and a rush for the bath.
Valerie, seated at the piano, was playing Massenet's _Elegie_, and
Every was lolling in a deep chair before the fire, studying a map of
the county and thinking upon the morrow's hunt. In such circumstances
it is not surprising that the printed appearance of Saddle Tree Cross
should have remembered Lyveden.

"By the way, Val," he said, raising his voice to override the music, "I
met a pal of yours the other day."

Valerie raised her eyebrows and continued to play.

"Did you?" she said, without turning. "Who was that?"

"Major Lyveden."

The _Elegie_ died a sudden discordant death, and Valerie started to her
feet.

"_Where?_"

The flame of the inquiry scorched Peter Every's ears.

Dropping the map and getting uncertainly upon his feet, he demanded
aggrievedly to be told what on earth was the matter....

On trying subsequently coherently to recall what had happened in the
next five minutes, he found his memory pardonably confused.

Valerie had taken him by the shoulders and shaken him like a rat: she
had hurled at his head an unending stream of questions--all about
Lyveden, and, when he had hesitated, had shaken him again; when he had
tried to protest, she had put her hand over his mouth; when she had
clearly exhausted his memory, she had announced that they would go up
to Town the next day, and that on Sunday morning, sun, rain, or snow,
he would motor her down to where Lyveden dwelt; then she had said she
was sorry she'd shaken him, smiled him a maddening smile, told him,
with a rare blush, that Anthony Lyveden was "the most wonderful man in
the world," kissed him between the eyes, and then darted out of the
room, calling for Lady Touchstone....

Sitting that night upon the edge of his bed, with his hands in his
pockets and a pipe in his mouth, staring moodily upon the carpet, Peter
had thought ruefully upon his shattered fortune.

"Blinkin' fine week-end," he muttered, "I don't think. I roll up for a
hunt an' a dart at the most priceless girl that ever was foaled, an' I
lose the one an' am roped in to help the other to another cove." He
laughed bitterly. "'Minds me of a drama-play. S'pose I'm cast for the
perishin' strong man wot 'ides 'is bleedin' 'eart." He flung out a
dramatic a