Mr. Waddington of Wyck. Sinclair May

I."

      "Mother would have hated you to think she did."

      "I never thought it. She must have known I didn't."

      "Then why—"

      "Did we lose sight?"

      "Yes, why? People don't, if they can help it, if they care enough. And mother cared."

      "You're a persistent little thing, aren't you? Are you trying to make out that I didn't care?"

      "I'm trying to make you see that mother did."

      "Well, my dear, we both cared, but we couldn't help it. We married, and our husbands didn't hit it off."

      "Didn't they? And daddy was so nice. Didn't you know how nice he was?"

      "Oh, yes. I knew. My husband was nice, too, Barbara; though you mightn't think it."

      "Oh, but I do. I'm sure he is. Only I haven't seen him yet."

      "So nice. But," said Fanny, pursuing her own thought, "he never made a joke in his life, and your father never made anything else."

      "Daddy didn't 'make' jokes. They came to him."

      "I've seen them come. He never sent any of them away, no matter how naughty they were, or how expensive. I used to adore his jokes. … But Horatio didn't. He didn't like my adoring them, so you see—"

      "I see. I wonder," said Barbara, looking up at the portrait again, "what he's thinking about?"

      "I used to wonder."

      "But you know now?"

      "Yes, I know now," Fanny said.

      "What'll happen," said Barbara, "if I make jokes?"

      "Nothing. He'll never see them."

      "If he saw daddy's—"

      "Oh, but he didn't. That was me."

      Barbara was thoughtful. "I daresay," she said, "you won't keep me long.

       Supposing I can't do the work?"

      "The work?" Fanny's eyes were interrogative and a little surprised, as though they were saying, "Who said work? What work?"

      "Well, Mr. Waddington's work. I've got to help him with his book, haven't I?"

      "Oh, his book, yes. When he's writing it. He isn't always. Does he look," said Fanny, "like a man who'd always be writing a book?"

      "No. I can't say he does, exactly." (What did he look like?)

      "Well, then, it'll be all right. I mean we shall be."

      "I only wondered whether I could really do what he wants."

      "If Ralph could," said Fanny, "you can."

      "Who's Ralph?"

      "Ralph is my cousin. He was Horatio's secretary."

      "Was." Barbara considered it. "Did he make jokes, then?"

      "Lots. But that wasn't why he left. … It was an awful pity, too; because he's most dreadfully hard up."

      "If he's hard up," Barbara said, "I couldn't bear to think I've done him out of a job."

      "You haven't. He had to go."

      Fanny turned again to her flowers and Barbara to her Stores list.

      "Are you sure," Fanny said suddenly, "you put 'striped'?"

      "Striped? The pyjamas? No, I haven't."

      "Then, for goodness' sake, put it. Supposing they sent those awful Futurist things; why, he'd frighten me into fits. Can't you see Horatio stalking in out of his dressing-room, all magenta blobs and forked lightning?"

      "I haven't seen him at all yet," said Barbara.

      "Well, you wait. … Does my humming annoy you?"

      "Not a bit. I like it. It's such a happy sound."

      "I always do it," said Fanny, "when I'm happy."

      You could hear feet, feet in heavy soled boots, clanking on the drive that ringed the grass-plot and the sundial; the eager feet of a young man. Fanny turned her head, listening.

      "There is Ralph," she said. "Come in, Ralph!"

      The young man stood in the low, narrow doorway, filling it with his slender height and breadth. He looked past Fanny, warily, into the far corner of the room, and when his eyes found Barbara at her bureau they smiled.

      "Oh, come in," Fanny said. "He isn't here. He won't be till Friday. This is Ralph Bevan, Barbara; and this is Barbara Madden, Ralph."

      He bowed, still smiling, as if he saw something irrepressibly amusing in her presence there.

      "Yes," said Fanny to the smile. "Your successor."

      "I congratulate you, Miss Madden."

      "Don't be an ironical beast. She's just said she couldn't bear to think she'd done you out of your job."

      "Well, I couldn't," said Barbara.

      "That's very nice of you. But you didn't do me out of anything. It was the act of God."

      "It was Horatio's act. Not that Miss Madden meant any reflection on his justice and his mercy."

      "I don't know about his justice," Ralph said. "But he was absolutely merciful when he fired me out."

      "Is it so awfully hard then?" said Barbara.

      "You may not find it so."

      "Oh, but I'm going to be Mrs. Waddington's companion, too."

      "You'll be all right then. They wouldn't let me be that."

      "He means you'll be safe, dear. You won't be fired out whatever happens."

      "Whatever sort of secretary I am?"

      "Yes. She can be any sort she likes, in reason, can't she?"

      "She can't be a worse one than I was, anyhow."

      Barbara was aware that he had looked at her, a long look, half thoughtful, half amused, as if he were going to say something different, something that would give her a curious light on herself, and had thought better of it.

      Fanny Waddington was protesting. "My dear boy, it wasn't for incompetence. She's simply dying to know what you did do."

      "You can tell her."

      "He wanted to write Horatio's book for him, and Horatio wouldn't let him. That was all."

      "Oh, well, I shan't want to write it," Barbara said.

      "We thought perhaps you wouldn't," said Fanny.

      But Barbara had turned to her bureau, affecting a discreet absorption in her list. And presently Ralph Bevan went out into the garden with Fanny to gather more tulips.

II

       Table of Contents

      1

      She had been dying to know what he had done, but now, after Ralph had stayed to lunch and tea and dinner that first day, after he had spent all yesterday at the Manor, and after he had turned up to-day at ten o'clock in the morning, Barbara thought she had made out the history, though they had been very discreet and Fanny had insisted on reading "Tono-Bungay" out loud half the time.

      Ralph, of course, was in love with his cousin Fanny. To be sure, she must be at least ten years older than he was, but that wouldn't matter. And, of course, it was rather naughty of him, but then again, very likely he couldn't help it. It had just