"Know her--of course I know her. Didn't Marjorie bring her here from
Miss Skinner's two holidays running? A very beautiful and brilliant
girl, the loveliest girl I think I ever saw! Really, Hugh Alston, though
I am surprised and pained at your silence and duplicity, I must absolve
you. I always regarded you as more or less a fool, but Joan Meredyth is
a girl any man might fall in love with!"

Hugh sat gripping the arms of his chair. What had he done, or rather
what had Marjorie done? What desperate muddle had that little maid led
him into? He had counted on the name being a pure invention, and now--

"Where is she?" demanded Lady Linden.

"I don't know--we--we parted!"

"Why?"

"We didn't get on, you see. She'd got a temper, and so--"

"Of course she had a temper. She is a spirited gel, full of life and
fire and intelligence. I wouldn't give twopence for a woman without a
temper--certainly she had a temper! Bah, don't talk to me, sir--you sit
there and tell me you were content to let her go, let a beautiful
creature like that go merely because she had a temper?"

"She--she went. I didn't let her go; she just went!"

"Yes," Lady Linden said thoughtfully, "I suppose she did. It is just
what Joan would do! She saw that she was not appreciated; you wrangled,