name--Lakeholm. To the left of the house a coppice of bronze beeches
shone with dark lustre; clumps of rhododendrons enlivened the green
with splashes of color. Lombardy poplars, with their gibbetlike
erectness, bordered the roads and intersected them with mathematical
shadows; here and there rose a feathery elm or a maple of
wide-branched beauty. To the right, a shallow fall of terraces led to
the Italian garden, Mrs. Dinsmore's chief pride, now a glory of
matched and patterned color and a dazzle of spray from marble basins.
Beyond all the careful, exotic beauty of the place, the wide valley
dipped away, alternate meadow and grove, until it met the silvery
shiver of willows marking the course of the river. Beyond that again,
the hills, solemn in unbroken green, rose to cloud-touched heights.

Before the house Brockton's new automobile waited. He himself leaned
against a stone pillar of the piazza, facing his hostess, who sat on
the edge of a chair in the tense attitude of protest against delay.
She had scarcely recovered from her waking crossness yet, and found
herself more irritated than amused at the eccentricities of her guest.
She was wondering with unusual asperity why a man with such
lack-lustre blue eyes dared to wear a tie of such brilliant contrast.
He interrupted her musings.

"Miss Harned seems mighty stand-offish these days."

"Millicent is a little difficult," admitted Millicent's cousin.

"What do you suppose it is? She seemed all smooth enough in New York
last winter, and even in the spring after--But now--" He paused again
without finishing his sentence. "And I had counted on your influence
to make her more approachable."