"No: there was no time. We were beyond hearing-distance when he ran to
the back door of the car; and there was no time before that. But it's
very odd!"

"What's very odd?"

"Why, his conduct. It is so strange that he has not made himself known
to us, if he's an officer."

"Probably he doesn't know you--or we--are connected with the army,
Kate."

"Oh, yes, he does. The porter knows perfectly well, and I told him just
before he left."

"Yes, but he didn't know before that time, did he?"

"He ought to have known," said Mrs. Rayner, uncompromisingly. "At least,
he should if he had taken the faintest interest. I mentioned Captain
Rayner so that he could not help hearing."

This statement being one that Miss Travers could in no wise
contradict,--as it was one, indeed, that Mrs. Rayner could have
dispensed with as unnecessary,--the younger lady again betook herself to
silence and pulling the kitten's ears.

"Even if he didn't know before," continued her sister, after a pause in
which she had apparently been brooding over the indifference of the
young man in question, "he ought to have made himself known after I told
him who I was." Another pause. "That's what I did it for," she wound up,