Alone with her mother, at tea-time, Cicely mentioned casually her visit to Mrs. Rockram and her meeting with Grimshaw upon the village green. Lady Selina nodded with Olympian majesty when she heard of the Babbington-Raikes letter, saying blandly:

“Under the unhappy circumstances, I could not expect Mr. Grimshaw to waste his undoubted talents and energies in Upworthy.”

Cicely said hastily:

“He seemed to ask for—for our opinion, and of course I replied that he would do what seemed right.”

Lady Selina smiled maternally:

“Very proper, my dear. And Dr. Pawley is so much stronger. Really, he doesn’t need a partner now.”

She sipped her tea, hardly missing the cream. Cicely observed with irrelevance:

“I often wonder why Dr. Pawley never married.”

“Ah, well, I could enlighten you, child, about that.”

“Do, please!”

Whereupon Lady Selina unfolded a romantic tale with a gusto in the telling of it not wasted upon her listener. Pawley was presented as a young, ardent man, whimsical, attractive, and something of a cavalier. As a rider to hounds, he had won the friendship of the late Squire of Upworthy. Cicely was well aware of this, a fact that tickled her humour. With a full appreciation of the part played by fox-hunting in the making of the nation, she learnt also, not with surprise, that a bold horseman had captivated the interest of a daughter of the county, now a rotund matron, the wife of a baronet who lived a dozen miles away. Lady Selina was describing vividly, with corroborative detail, the process of transmuting mere interest into love, when Cicely interjected rather sharply:

“I understand—the affair was nipped.”

Lady Selina hated interruptions.

“Don’t nip me, my dear. What happened can be put adequately without using slang. Common sense prevailed. Your dear father, indeed, had a finger in the pie....”

“Pressure!” exclaimed the young lady. “I should have thought,” she added, “that Dr. Pawley would not have yielded to pressure.”

“Which shows, my dear, that you don’t know him. At any rate, he did the wise and honourable thing. None of us, high or low, can afford to ignore public opinion. In this case, everything turned out for the best. Dr. Pawley’s straightforward conduct served to establish his position. When the facts became known, the best houses opened their doors to him.”

“But he lost a partner.”

“That loss turned into a substantial gain. I have often thought that celibacy is best for doctors and clergymen. If they marry, they should choose helpmeets. But I can understand, also, that such a man as my dear old friend, having loved truly a young lady of quality—she had very great charm and distinction, I can assure you—would not care to look elsewhere. And here again his fidelity to an ideal has endeared him to all of us.”

Lady Selina sighed. Cicely murmured pensively:

“I wonder what Tiddy would say.”

“I can imagine what your friend would say, Cicely, and I am glad that she is not here to say it. Noblesse oblige happens to be a phrase which the daughter of Sir Nathaniel Tiddle couldn’t be expected to understand.”

“She understands it right enough, and she’s jolly glad that it doesn’t apply to her. In ten days she comes to Wilverley.”

“Really!”

Lady Selina looked down her nose, and the shape of it may have encouraged her to remark:

“You know, child, that this friendship of yours with a rather unrestrained and undisciplined young woman is a certain anxiety to me. However ...!”

With a gesture that might have become the mother of the Gracchi, Lady Selina dismissed Miss Tiddle.

But, till Cicely returned to duty the girl was lapped in tenderness and solicitude. Let no man assume too hastily that design lurked beneath soft glances and rare caresses. At any moment a few pencilled words upon a telegram might apprise Lady Selina of the loss of a son. Because such fear impended, she clutched desperately at her daughter, striving to hold in her masterful grasp the essential possession, strangely conscious that the spirit eluded her, that flesh and blood obscured the real Cicely. It was hardly credible that her girl did not think as she did upon matters supremely affecting conduct. Yet she dared not break down virginal reserves with direct questions. And she could remember that between herself and her mother there had been the same queer intermittencies of sympathy, the thus-far-and-no-farther limit that blighted full-blooming confidence.

You may be sure that she rejoiced unaffectedly at Grimshaw’s departure from Upworthy, meaning to speed him on his way with gracious smiles, hoping and praying that he would never return. During the five minutes that she devoted each night to prayer and introspection, she decided that Providence had deigned to stretch forth a delivering Hand. With fervent faith she beheld clearly the Divine Intention.

Cicely had not inherited this clarity of vision.

She went back to Wilverley a much-bewildered maid, almost at the mercy of circumstances and surroundings, feeling strangely invertebrate and listless. For the moment we may compare her to a cog on a machine. Being a true Chandos she intended to do her work efficiently. That would suffice till—till Tiddy came. Tiddy would revitalise her. Meanwhile, she contemplated with some dismay the certainty of talk not with but from the tremendous Mrs. Roden.

That good lady eyed her critically.

“Too much Christmas,” she said trenchantly.

Out of sight and hearing of her august mother, Cicely often amused herself by understudying Tiddy. So she replied calmly:

“Yes; I overrate myself. Plum-pudding and mince-pies. What can you expect when a poor girl is hungry and greedy?”

Mrs. Roden smiled grimly. Cicely’s spirit did not displease her. The one thing needful in a world to be regenerated by WOMAN was spirit.

“We missed you, my dear. Arthur was quite depressed. How is your mother?”

“Just the same.”

“Wonderful woman! The world is in the melting-pot, but she doesn’t change. Sometimes I envy her. Amazing powers of detachment.”

“And attachment. She was sweet to me, Mrs. Roden. I—I hated to leave her alone in that big house.”

“You know that you are wanted here.”

As if this statement exacted emphasis, Wilverley came in, unmistakably joyous, holding out two hands. And he happened to be looking his best in riding-kit, exuding energy and goodwill, so delighted to see Cicely that his genial tones betrayed him as lover and would-be conqueror. She felt herself whirled away upon a flood of eager questions, which taken collectively embodied the supreme question. Mrs. Roden tactfully retired.

“He is going to propose now,” thought Cicely. “How can I prevent him?”

They were in the big library filled with superbly-bound tomes that were never read, bought wholesale, with true decorative instinct, by the first Lord Wilverley. Opulence characterised the room from floor to ceiling. Cicely sank into the carpet and into an arm-chair, almost overpowered by the sense of luxury and comfort. A violent temptation assailed her. Why not float with the current instead of against it? The excitement of any change from apathetic and dull conditions beguiled her. All of us know how the Great War engendered excitement. Possibly women were more susceptible to a craving for action than men. Action was forced upon men.

She heard Wilverley’s sincere voice repeating what his sister had affirmed, but with an emphasis not to be denied.

“I have missed you horribly.”

“But you hardly ever saw me.”

“You were here, in my house. When you left it seemed empty to me. Now that you have come back——!”

He broke off abruptly, waiting, perhaps, for some encouraging glance. Cicely stared at the carpet. Her cheeks were slightly flushed. Although she wished to procrastinate, she was sensible that this big man, so close to her, so alive with energy, was presenting himself insistently. A strong mind was modifying and reconstructing hers. All that he represented seemed to force itself upon her notice. If he won her, she would be regarded as his most precious possession. He stood, first and last, for—Security. The time and attention that he gave to the humblest of his dependents would be hers inalienably. He would be faithful and true to his marriage vows. She would be enshrined in a velvet-lined casket.

Safe harbourage!

How much it means to women! And particularly to women of imaginative temperament, who, like homing birds, are gifted with the sense of direction. Cicely’s imagination had carried her afield. In Miss Tiddle’s agreeable company she had explored highways and byways, wandering down the latter with the comforting reflection that she could leave them at a moment’s notice. Girls who indulge in such mental vagabondage are more likely to return to the highways than the unimaginative, who may fly the beaten track suddenly. With Miss Tiddle Cicely had dared to enter (metaphorically) the Divorce Court; she had flown upon imaginative wings into drawing-rooms where Mrs. Grundy refuses to go, where derelict wives bewail their mistake in marrying the wrong men.

To such a girl as Cicely the broad high road appears to be the only way. All the women of kin to her, with one notable exception, had stuck religiously to the main thoroughfare which stretches from Mayfair to John o’ Groat’s. And these kinswomen, taking them by and large, appeared to be happy and contented. The notable exception, who was never mentioned, remained an unseen object lesson of how not to do it!

Wilverley went on:

“The loneliness of a big house is rather disconcerting, Cis.”

He had never called her “Cis.”

“Even when it is a hospital?” she asked.

“The strange faces make it the more so. You must have noticed lately that I have talked a lot about myself. I wanted you to know me. I want desperately to know you, but somehow you are not very self-revealing.”

“Is anybody?”

If she could divert the talk into an impersonal channel procrastination might be achieved. Wilverley refused the bait.

“I have tried to be so to you. Tell me, Cis, do you see me as I am, a plain enough fellow who wishes with all his heart that he was more attractive?”

“I think I see you,” she admitted, after an instant’s hesitation.

“I have not studied the arts that please women.”

His modesty was so disarming that her face relaxed. She replied frankly:

“Really and truly I distrust those arts.”

Such kindliness informed her voice that he plunged.

“You are going back to your drudgery tonight. And I am up to my eyes in work also. So forgive me if I beat no bushes. You are too clever not to know what I want. Will you be my wife?”

“I—I don’t know,” she faltered.

His face fell, but he recovered quickly. He muttered disconsolately:

“What a muddle I’ve made of this!” And then a happy inspiration came to his rescue. He said awkwardly: “You see, dearest, it’s a first attempt, but you encourage me to hope that it may not be the last. May I try again?”

Cicely said desperately:

“I do feel such a fool. I—I don’t know my own mind, Arthur. It’s humiliating to say so.”

“Nothing of the sort. Let us mark time. I believe I fell in love with you when you were a tiny. Perhaps you will laugh at me when I tell you that I sneaked a hanky of yours before you put your hair up.”

“Arthur! ... I hope it was a nice one. Did—did you have to send it to the wash?”

“Oh, no,” he reassured her.

They laughed, and the strain was over. Perhaps—who can say?—an experienced courtier might have achieved less. Henceforward Cicely beheld Wilverley in a more romantic light.

“When I try again,” he said shyly, “I shall show you the hanky.”

“I am like my hankies,” Cicely replied, “more ornamental than useful.”

Soon afterwards she went upstairs to the room which she was to share with Miss Tiddle. As she put on her uniform she thought to herself:

“I wonder what Tiddy will think of him.”