as if afraid of that brief pause. "You've no idea, Inez, how uncommonly
familiar and jolly this blue room, this red fire, looked a moment ago,
as I stepped out of the darkness and rain. It brings back the old
times--this used to be _her_ favorite morning-room," he glanced at
the mother's picture, "and summer and winter a fire always burned
here, as now. And you, Inez, _cara mia_, with your gypsy face, most
familiar of all."

She moves over to the mantel. It is very low; she leans one arm upon
it, looks steadily at him, and speaks at last.

"I am glad Sir Victor Catheron can remember the old times, can still
recall his mother, has a slight regard left for Catheron Royals, and
am humbly grateful for his recollection of his gypsy cousin. From his
conduct of late it was hardly to have been expected."

"It is coming," thinks Sir Victor, with an inward groan; "and, O Lord!
_what_ a row it is going to be. When Inez shuts her lips up in that
tight line, and snaps her black eyes in that unpleasant way, I know
to my cost, it means 'war to the knife.' I'll be routed with dreadful
slaughter, and Inez's motto is ever, 'Woe to the conqueror!' Well,
here goes!"

He looks up at her, a good-humored smile on his good-looking face.

"Humbly grateful for my recollection of you! My dear Inez, I don't
know what you mean. As for my absence--"

"As for your absence," she interrupts, "you were to have been here, if
your memory will serve you, on the first of June. It is now the close