"Isn't it frightful!" said old Miss Firs-Robinson, exclaiming as much with her hands as with her tongue. "Such a death!"

"A terrible death, indeed," returned Mrs. Poynter—a pretty, fashionable-looking young woman—with deep commiseration. "So sudden!"

It was the next day, and the news of Mrs. Darkham's death had spread and was now known far and wide. All the people in Rickton had "a day," and this one belonged to Miss Firs-Robinson. A most blessed thing, as everyone wanted to meet every one else and discuss with them the tragedy. It was the rector's wife who had been the first to use the word "tragedy," and it had caught on at once. "She is so clever, you know. Always the right word on every occasion. Really quite talented! The rector could never get on without her; she has been the making of him. That last sermon of his about regeneration, surely—well! And she does write, you know, for some of the papers. At all events, she has been known to answer a charade most successfully. You must remember. It began with "My first was an ass.""

Lord Ambert and Elfrida were playing tennis in the courts below against Captain Poynter and a rather pretty girl who was staying with the Poynters.

Mr. Blount was standing on the terrace close to the nearest point from which the tennis-court could be seen. He was supposed to be making himself agreeable to the companion Fate had accorded him for the moment, but in reality he was watching Elfrida with a sad but absorbed gaze. Agatha Nesbitt, sitting at the end of the terrace, seemed to read his thoughts, and beckoned him to come to her. She herself was sitting where whoever came to the hall-door could be readily seen.

"And I hear," said Mrs. Poynter, arching her brows and putting on a look of perfect misery, "that Dr. Darkham is absolutely inconsolable."

"Oh my dear, do you think so? Well, I don't know, I'm sure." Miss Firs-Robinson as she spoke turned purple. "He is—well, you know, I don't like him. But dissolute—one should be charitable, my dear. I confess I have thought him a little queer at times in his ways, but nothing so far gone as that. No, no."

"You mistake me," said Mrs. Poynter, flushing delicately, yet with a glance round her. She wanted to laugh, but it is so impossible to laugh alone. She caught Dicky Browne's eye at this moment, however, and was happy.

"I'm sure I do, my dear," said old Miss Firs-Robinson heartily, who was really a good soul. "Poor man! I'm talking of Dr. Darkham, Dicky; he's gone all to pieces, they tell me, over this business."

"I hope sincerely nobody will put him together again," returned Mr. Browne piously.

"Such a feeling man!" said Mrs. Greatorex, dropping into a chair near them. "No wonder he is in such a terrible state. I fear this sad occurrence will place the neighbourhood in grief for some time."

"I suppose so. And yet"—Mrs. Poynter turned to her next neighbour—"You see, she was such a stranger to us, poor woman! Such a stranger!" She lifted her pale-gray gloves here, and did something to her veil. "Did you" said she gently, looking at Mrs. Greatorex, "see much or her?"

Mrs. Poynter's voice was wonderful. It was a perfect coo, like a dove's. And she was very good-natured, too, in her own way, but it had to be her own way. She detested anything unpleasant, anything that interfered with her, anything that rubbed her up the wrong way, and she certainly detested Dr. Darkham. But she had a little way with her that precluded the idea of her detesting anybody.

"Oh yes, very, very often," said Mrs. Greatorex sweetly. "I always tried to do what I could for her, poor creature!"

"And you?" said Mrs. Poynter, turning to Miss Firs-Robinson, who was looking grim. The old lady had been studying Mrs. Greatorex.

"Did you see much of her?"

"Well, as little as I could help," said the spinster with all the candour that adorned her, and a trifle of anger besides. "Because a more odious, a more unpleasant person I never met in my life."

"Oh, dear Miss Firs-Robinson!" cried the rector's wife, a little sallow woman. "You should remember, you should indeed. She is dead, you know."

"Yes, I do know," said the old lady in a loud voice, "but how does that alter matters? If the dead want to be praised, they ought to behave themselves properly whilst they are alive, and she didn't. I am sorry the poor woman died like that, without returning to consciousness even for a little while."

"It was quite hopeless from the very first," said Mrs. Poynter.

"Dr. Bland and Dr. Dillwyn were both quite agreed about that."

"Oh no!" Agatha spoke as if involuntarily. "Not quite agreed. Dr. Dillwyn told me she might recover."

"Told you?" questioned Mrs. Greatorex quite gently. Then with a little smile: "But when, dear Agatha?"

The girl looked at her and paused. She seemed to struggle with a certain confusion.

Mrs. Greatorex, who would have made a splendid diplomatist, at once regretted her question, and stepped into the breach. She had made up her mind that her niece was to settle herself in life well, and to have her even "mentioned" with so deplorable a detrimental as Dillwyn—a young doctor just making his first breach through the wall of life—would be destruction. She therefore came to Agatha's rescue, and accepted the question as answered.

"He seems to have had two minds on the subject," she said slightingly, "which only shows how ridiculous it would be to place any confidence in his opinion. Young men of his age are not to be relied upon."

"I wonder if the party at Ambert Towers will be put off?" said the rector's wife, lowering her voice and speaking confidentially. "It was to be on Thursday next." "I should think not. Lord Ambert is not the sort of man to—-"

"No, he is not, indeed."

"He seems to me more reserved than unsympathetic," said Mrs. Greatorex, who always supported him on principle. Were they not of the same class? "Are you going?" asked she, addressing Mrs. Poynter.

"We've been asked," said that pretty woman, with downcast lids.

"But do you think one should go—with this death so very recent? Are"—she paused prettily—"are you going?"

"Not as to a party"—with much empressement. "It will, I feel sure, be a quiet affair, on account of poor Dr. Darkham's bereavement."

"Oh, bereavement!" Mrs. Poynter permitted herself first a smile, and then gave way to a subdued laugh. "I say, mustn't he be glad?" said she.

"My dear Mrs. Poynter, hush! If any one should hear you! And, really, you take quite a wrong view of it. You are worse than Mr. Browne, who says quite dreadful things. I admire Dr. Darkham, you know—I do indeed. I think him an ideal man. Fancy his devotion to that dreadful being all these years!" She lifted her hands.

"Such a handsome man, my dear Mrs. Poynter; he is one in a thousand."

"So glad," said Mrs. Poynter, rather frivolously. "Two of him in a thousand would be more than one could endure. To me he always seems—don't you know—well, so out of it."

"Out of it?"

"Well, not in it, don't you know. A—a little on one side— eh? A little—well, vulgar is a horrid word, isn't it? Oh, how d'ye do, Lord Ambert? Been winning as usual?"

"Not as usual. I've been winning to-day because Miss Firs-Robinson has been my partner!"

"Oh, I like that," said Elfrida, who was with him. "As if I was the least use to you! You could have won the game quite as well without me—better, I dare say. I don't believe I made five good strokes all day. My ball went into the net, instead of over it, every time. I'm a perfect fraud!" She looked up at Blount suddenly, brilliantly, intentionally. "Now am I not, Mr. Blount?"

Blount hesitated and coloured, and Lord Ambert stared at him superciliously. Blount shook his head.

"You must let me contradict you," said he shyly, boyishly.

"Shall I get you some tea?" asked Ambert, who was frowning.

"No, thank you. There is claret-cup somewhere, if one could only find it. Mr. Blount, will you come with me on a voyage of discovery?"

Poor Blount! His eyes lit up. He went quickly to her, and she led him a fool's dance for the next ten minutes.

Ambert strolled leisurely away in an opposite direction, his face set and angry.

"What a pity it is that she will encourage that poor boy!" said Mrs. Poynter to Agatha. "And when her mind is so entirely made up to marry Lord Ambert!"

"Then you think—-"

"I am afraid she is a terrible flirt," said Agatha. Whereon they both laughed.

"Here comes John Dillwyn," said Mrs. Poynter presently. "And straight to us. You are not a flirt, I know, Agatha—which makes me all the more afraid for you. You know he hasn't a penny. Well, John," taking a sympathetic note at once, "so that poor woman has slipped through your fingers. We are all so shocked about it. There was no hope from the beginning, I suppose?"

"I don't think that. I fully believed there was a chance for her, but it was a bare one. Still—-"—he knitted his brows as if perplexed—"I believed in it."

"You mustn't say that now, John," said Mrs. Poynter, patting her cousin's arm; "you have your fortune to make, you know, and mistakes are fatal. Ah, you'll get on, John; you have the courage to confess your faults," said his cousin, smiling; "but don't confess them before unappreciative people. Dr. Darkham is, of course, very—-"

"I saw him only for a moment this morning. He looked like death himself. I had no idea he—er—cared for her so much. His face looked quite changed."

"Agatha, I think we must go now," said a cold voice. Mrs. Greatorex laid her hand on Agatha's shoulder. "How d'ye do, Dr. Dillywn? I hope you have seen poor Dr. Darkham, and that he is bearing up?"

"He seems greatly cut up," said Dillwyn.

"Ah, as I said. So sympathetic, so tender-hearted! I should so like to tell him how I feel for him."

"I am afraid you will have no chance of doing that except by letter. He is leaving home directly after the funeral for some months."

"And are you to look after his patients?" asked Mrs. Greatorex, turning to Dillwyn.

"Oh no"—smiling. "I am not big enough for that. Bland is to see to them."

Once settled in the fly, that on all occasions was borrowed from the inn to convey them to such distances as Mrs. Greatorex could not walk, the latter turned to her niece.

"When did Dr. Dillwyn tell you Mrs. Darkham might recover?" asked she very quietly.

"Last evening. I was standing at the gate, and he happened to be passing by. I asked him about Mrs. Darkham's condition, and he told me he thought she might recover, but it was very doubtful."

"I should think," said Mrs. Greatorex presently, "between you and me, that Dr. Darkham is feeling profoundly relieved at this present moment."

"You mean—-"

"That that woman was the curse of his existence for the past twenty years."

"She was dreadful, certainly. But Dr.—Dr. Dillwyn said he looked so sorry."

"It was a shock, of course, but he will recover from that in no time. And he is a handsome man, and rich and clever."

"Yes." Agatha looked at her as if wondering. There had been some meaning in her tone that the girl felt but did not understand.

"Yes. Don't you see? There is a chance for you now," said Mrs. Greatorex playfully, but with deadly meaning. The girl, after a swift glance at her, turned away. She felt cold and sick. Was this woman human, to pretend—to jest so—on the very threshold of death? And was it all jesting? She drew a long breath, as if suffocating.

"How can you talk like that?" she said.