an end between us. We've just parted in tears--but not in
silence!"

"Just parted? Do you mean to say you've been there all this
time?"

"Ever since you used to come there to see Lady Ulrica? Does
it seem to you so awfully long ago?"

The unexpectedness of the thrust--as well as its doubtful
taste--chilled his growing enjoyment of her chatter. He had
really been getting to like her--had recovered, under the
candid approval of her eye, his usual sense of being a
personable young man, with all the privileges pertaining to
the state, instead of the anonymous rag of humanity he had
felt himself in the crowd on the pier. It annoyed him, at
that particular moment, to be reminded that naturalness is
not always consonant with taste.

She seemed to guess his thought. "You don't like my saying
that you came for Lady Ulrica?" she asked, leaning over the
table to pour herself a second cup of tea.

He liked her quickness, at any rate. "It's better," he
laughed, "than your thinking I came for Mrs. Murrett!"

"Oh, we never thought anybody came for Mrs. Murrett! It was
always for something else: the music, or the cook--when
there was a good one--or the other people; generally ONE
of the other people."