Dinah was that chief; and she, Linda Thorne, was genuinely ready to abdicate. There was in Linda’s nature a thin stratum of Bohemianism; the bulk of the woman was Philistine. She liked small popularities, to air her domestic excellences, her devotion to her Robbie! She liked to talk serious talk. She liked to dine with the Archdeacon! Sooner than run the risk of scandal, or go through scenes of such dimensions as this scene with Dinah, she felt that it would be well to take Robbie and the infant, pack up her portmanteau, and fly. Oh, if Mrs. Arbuthnot--a bright thought striking her--could but be made to pack up _hers_ and go--never to return! Even if poor Dinah took the worshipped Gaston with her, Mrs. Thorne felt that the price would not be too high. She would forfeit every sentimental friendship in the world sooner than again encounter the scorn, the passion of Dinah’s girlish face. Above all--with an audience! It was, really, this vision of an audience, of public battles-royal, of ridicule, perhaps of acknowledged defeat, which fired Linda Thorne’s conscience to the height of renunciation. Arriving at the garden gate of The Bungalow she heard, no unfamiliar sound, the voices of Rahnee and of Gaston Arbuthnot, at high play within. Before discovering herself, the mistress of the house peeped for a minute through the ivy-covered railings. She saw Rahnee aloft on Arbuthnot’s tall shoulder, one little skinny hand clutching tight round his neck, the other beating him stoutly with a switch. ‘Faster! Missy But’not! Dallop, dallop!’ shrieked Rahnee. The child’s vigorous kicks were testifying to her delicious sense of power over her slave, when the unwelcome gleam of a scarlet sunshade caught her eyes. ‘Rahnee--terrible infant!’ cried Linda, falling back on the tired Indian voice that had been absent during her colloquy with Dinah. ‘Come down, naughty girl. Think how you must be teasing Mr. Arbuthnot.’ ‘No, me not tease Missy But’not. Go away!’ The thin arms imperiously motioned Linda’s dismissal. ‘We not want nobody--Missy But’not and Rahnee!’ ‘My visit is to Rahnee exclusively,’ observed Gaston. ‘Remember, Mrs. Thorne! You warned me not to come to The Bungalow. A mysterious something might happen before five o’clock converting us for ever into enemies. But I will not have Rahnee included in the feud.’ ‘Did I talk such nonsense--really?’ cried Linda, with a forced laugh. ‘Well, who knows? Perhaps it will turn out that I was a prophetess, after all. Rahnee, little tyrant, come down this instant.’ At a signal from Mrs. Thorne the ayah, who had been placidly dozing on her square of carpet in the shade, arose. With a quick flank movement the black woman bore down on Rahnee. Upon this, Rahnee, clinging closer to Gaston, raised her shrill voice to its topmost limits.