‘The girl of the future peruses everything! Quain’s “Elements of Anatomy,”’ cried Marjorie, holding the volume as high out of Pouchée’s reach as its weight would allow. ‘I wonder whether our gentleman would lend it to us, if we asked him prettily? We might study our bones together, Pouchée. Who knows, in days to come, that I may not go for a Natural Science Tripos?’ And--with the book still held aloft--her nimble fingers found their way to the title-page. In the top right-hand corner was a name, written in characters she knew: ‘GEOFFREY ARBUTHNOT, _January_, 1880.’ For an instant Marjorie Bartrand turned ashen pale. Then as she recalled her position, as she realised that she had forced herself, unasked, into Geoffrey Arbuthnot’s room, the poor child crimsoned from throat to brow. She felt that the very soul within her had cause to blush over her temerity. ‘Let us come away this moment. I am taken by surprise--there has been some cruel mistake.’ The book almost fell out of her grasp. Swiftly as her limbs would carry her she made her way out of the room and down the stairs. Then, when they were safe again in the little salon, she caught Pouchée’s hand with passion. ‘I look to you, Mademoiselle, for an explanation,’ she cried with impetuous voice, with flaming eyes. ‘What right had you to conceal from me that Geoffrey Arbuthnot lived here?’ But Pouchée had the strength of conscious innocence. All further need of mystification was over now. Regarding their lodger as a shy recluse, an enemy of the sex, the two poor French ladies had striven with will to keep him and their visitor from meeting. This was the secret of their reticence, the sum of their offending. Mademoiselle Pouchée met Marjorie’s lightning glance calmly. ‘Mère and I had nothing to conceal. How could it have interested you to hear a stranger’s name?’ ‘And you have never spoken of me in his presence?’ ‘If we did, it was by hazard. Why should Marjorie Bartrand of Tintajeux be more than any other young lady to Mr. Geoffrey Arbuthnot?’ ‘Simply,’ returned Marjorie, closely watching Pouchée’s unmoved face,--‘simply because Mr. Geoffrey Arbuthnot had the picture of Tintajeux hanging on his walls.’ ‘By hazard, also. He took a fancy to the photograph from the first day he came to lodge with us. It had a look of Scotland,--it recalled some place where he had known good times. And so, to give him pleasure, I said that while he lodged here, Tintajeux should hang above his chimney-piece.’ ‘From whence it was unhung, by his own hand, to please the caprice of an unknown visitor. Mr. Arbuthnot is very generous!’