drawing-room table, and when we were all there after dinner George asked
me quite loud what these smart books were, and where they came from. So
altogether he has not come to see us for a long time; but as he happened
to be staying with the Mountshires, I begged him to come over for a
night or two; so you will hear him preach on Sunday."

At lunch that day Lady Atherley proposed that I should accompany them to
Woodcote. "Do come, Mr. Lyndsay," said Denis. "We shall have cakes for
tea, and jam-sandwiches as well."

"And there is an awfully jolly banister for sliding down," added Harold,
"without any turns or landing, you know."

I professed myself unable to resist such inducements. Indeed, I was
almost glad to go. The recollection of Mrs. Mostyn's cheerful face was as
alluring to me that day as the thought of a glowing hearth might be to
the beggar on the door-step. Here, at least, was one to whom life was a
blessing; who partook of all it could bestow with an appetite as
healthfully keen as her nephew's, but without his disinclination or
disregard for anything besides.

The mild March day felt milder, the rooks cawed more cheerfully, and the
spring flowers shone out more fearlessly around us when we had passed
through the white gates of Woodcote--a favoured spot gently declining to
the sunniest quarter, and sheltered from the north and north-east by
barricades of elm-woods. The tiny domain was exquisitely ordered, as I
love to see everything which appertains to women; and within the low
white house, furnished after the simple and stiff fashion of a past
generation, reigned the same dainty neatness, the same sunny
cheerfulness, the native atmosphere of its chatelaine Mrs. Mostyn--a