By this time Lady Selina was a-bed and Cicely was dining tÊte-À-tÊte with the parson. You may be sure that the good man played the host in the old-fashioned way. Port mellowed him, banishing disagreeable reflections. Cicely, unable to peer beneath a polished surface, tried to reflect herself in that surface and stared ruefully at a very blurred image. The parson’s slightly patronising tone when speaking of Grimshaw irritated her intensely, the more so because he laid an insistent finger upon what had irritated her.

“Your dear mother is no more responsible than I am. Why didn’t he say so? Heaven knows she needed a word of comfort. As her medical attendant, it was the man’s positive duty to cheer her up.”

Cicely said bravely:

“Mr. Goodrich, forgive me, but aren’t we all partly responsible?”

He blinked at her and sipped his wine.

“In a way, m’yes. Collectively the responsibility must be divided up. I deprecate violence.”

“So does Mr. Grimshaw.”

“Of course, he’s an outsider, and something of an iconoclast. A square peg, I grant you, in a round hole.”

“You admit that Upworthy is a hole?”

He blinked again, but the juice of the grape fortified him.

“It lies low; hence these grievous visitations. I remain loyal to Upworthy and your dear mother.”

The parlour-maid told her that Miss Tiddle was in the drawing-room.

“I’ll see her at once.”

Cicely rushed into Tiddy’s warm embrace.

“I want you more than anybody else,” she declared fervently.

“I’ve five minutes.”

Two of these precious minutes were devoted to details, but Cicely apparently took for granted what had been accomplished at the Hall. And, to Tiddy’s astonishment, she seemed equally indifferent to the exciting events on the green. She held Tiddy’s hand, squeezing it.

“When can I see you, Tiddy? I must see you. I must have a long talk.”

“Long talks are nearly always too long. You’ve something on your chest. Now pull up your socks and pin up your skirts and out with it. Wait! I’ll bet daddy’s pile that you and the Man with the Disconcerting Eyes have been passing more than the time o’ day.”

“You’re wonderful,” Cicely admitted.

“I’m alive,” remarked Miss Tiddle, complacently. “And my shot wasn’t a fluke; I played for it. What does dear mother say?”

“That’s it. She doesn’t know.”

“Nor do I yet. But I take it that you have really bounced out of the frying-pan into the fire?”

“Yes; I have.”

“I’m delighted to hear it. There is stuff in you, but only a can-opener, like me, is able to get it out. So the signal is S. O. S., eh?”

“Yes. Why can’t you sleep with me to-night?”

“Because I’m on duty, apart from other reasons. What are you going to do? Hide your head in the sand?”

“I don’t know what to do.”

Tiddy’s eyes sparkled.

“He does, though.”

Cicely answered evasively:

“A man’s methods are always so brutal.”

“That’s why really we love them. If I keep Lord Wilverley waiting he’ll be brutal; but for your sake I’ll risk that. Shall I tell you what to do?”

“Please!”

“Scrap the buskins! You can’t act for nuts. Nor can he. Both of you will give the show away if you try dissembling—always a rotten game.”

“Have you seen Mr. Grimshaw?”

“I left him up at the Hall.”

Cicely’s eyes softened.

“And he hasn’t had dinner.”

“He didn’t look as if he wanted dinner. But I’m sure he wants you—desperately. He appeared to me worn and torn to tatters. Make no error; you can’t rig him up in your moss.”

“There’s not much moss left.”

“Lots of it, believe me. I haven’t time to argue with you, Cis. I can make a guess at what’s in your mind, because, as I say, you’re easy to read, a big asset, if you knew it, and probably the thing that appeals tremendously to Mr. Grimshaw. If he begins to think you’re not straight he’ll fly the track.”

“Not straight!”

Tiddy answered impatiently:

“You want to have it both ways. You are most awfully sorry for your mother; you would like to be sweet to her, to play the devoted daughter; but what will all that sort of thing be worth when she finds you out? And she will. You want to be just as sweet, perhaps sweeter, to Mr. Grimshaw, and all the time he’ll see you playing a part with your mother, and, worse, forcing him to do the same. Really, you’re risking his love and your mother’s respect.”

Cicely frowned. Moss-scraping hurts.

“I suppose you’d rush in to mother, and, on top of this awful calamity, hit her hard on the head when she’s lying down.”

“If you speak of the fire, I don’t regard it as an awful calamity; nor do you. As to speaking to-night, that is absurd. To-morrow, or the day after, will be time enough. I am much sorrier for her than I am for you. I can measure her disappointment, but I can’t measure your folly if you play the wrong game. And now—I must hop it.”

“When are you going to France, Tiddy?”

“Why should I go to France?”

This was rank evasion, and Tiddy, challenged to practise what she had preached, knew it. A little red flowed into her cheeks.

“Because you told me that was your intention.”

“Well, we all change our minds, don’t we? I’m doing my bit here, and like the job. So that’s that.”

Her curls were a-flutter as she went out.

Cicely stood still listening, till she heard the purr of the big car. The thought came to her, as it had come to Grimshaw, that Tiddy was not going to France because she had more than liking for her present job. Jealous pangs assailed her. If Tiddy wanted Arthur she would get him.

And why not?

Presently she went upstairs to sit beside her mother. To her astonishment Lady Selina, fortified by soup and a cutlet, declared herself ready to discuss present and future.

“We can’t impose ourselves upon Mr. Goodrich, my dear, and Danecourt, under the circumstances, would be too depressing. Heaven alone knows when we shall get into our own house again. A fairly comfortable flat in London seems the one thing possible.”

“Oh! London!”

“I said London—not Timbuctoo. Do you object to London?”

“N-no.”

Lady Selina eyed her daughter sharply. As a matter of fact, she had thought of London entirely on Cicely’s account. Her own friends were living quietly in the country, more or less engrossed by patriotic work. London, she felt, would distract the child. And she hated flats.

“Would you prefer Bournemouth?”

A derisive inflection underlay the question. Lady Selina detested popular watering-places and big hotels, where food you didn’t want was placed before you at stated hours, and even earls’ daughters were known by chambermaids as numbers!

“Bournemouth! No.”

“Perhaps you will tell me what you would like before I try to go to sleep.”

Hunted into a corner, Cicely said hastily:

“There is Happy Mead, isn’t there?”

Happy Mead, with its preposterous name, had long been a source of unhappiness to Lady Selina, because, in accordance with her principles, she had declined to spend much money upon a dilapidated house, tenantless for more years than she dared to reckon. Too big for people of small means, and not likely to appeal to the well-to-do accustomed to modern comforts, it was situated about a mile from Upworthy in a pretty but neglected garden.

“That ruin! What a suggestion!” She continued irritably: “I don’t pretend to understand you, Cicely. I should have thought that a girl not absolutely devoid of pride would have seen the propriety of leaving her own county for a season if she was offered the chance.”

Chandos silence countered this observation, and, looking at Cicely’s firm little chin, Lady Selina told herself that the child had really very little of the Danecourt pride. Having taken her own line over a stiff country, she would stick to it. The mother went on after a pause:

“I dislike London in war-time, but we must go there.”

Having delivered this ultimatum, Lady Selina indicated by her manner that she intended to compose herself to sleep, adding:

“I expect to lie awake half the night.”

However, Grimshaw, it appeared, had provided against this unpleasant probability. A mild sleeping-draught was sent from Pawley’s dispensary. Cicely, when she administered the Lethean liquid, regretted that so thoughtful a man had not sent enough for two.