"I've been at her house in Newport ever since. Came down yesterday to try
to earn some money," he continued, cheerfully making himself agreeable.
"Deuced clever woman, much too clever for me and Jerry too. Always in a
tete-a-tete with an antiquarian or a pathologist, or a psychologist, and
tells novelists what to put into their next books and jurists how to
decide cases. Full of modern and liberal ideas--believes in free love and
all that sort of thing, and gives Jerry the dickens for practising it."

"Oh!" exclaimed Honora.

Mr. Cuthbert, however, did not appear to realize that he had shocked her.

"By the way," he asked, "have you seen Cecil Grainger since the
Quicksands game?"

"No," she replied. "Has Mr. Grainger been at Quicksands since?"

"Nobody knows where he's been," answered Mr. Cuthbert. "It's a mystery.
He hasn't been home--at Newport, I mean-for a fortnight. He's never
stayed away so long without letting any one know where he is. Naturally
they thought he was at Mrs. Kame's in Banbury, but she hasn't laid eyes
on him. It's a mystery. My own theory is that he went to sleep in a
parlour car and was sent to the yards, and hasn't waked up."

"And isn't Mrs. Grainger worried?" asked Honora.

"Oh, you never can tell anything about her," he said. "Do you know her?
She's a sphinx. All the Pendletons are Stoics. And besides, she's been so
busy with this Charities Conference that she hasn't had time to think of
Cecil. Who's that?"