"'Dear Joan would like'--_would_ she?" commented Hughie. "I'm afraid it's Ursula Harbord I'm going to have the few words with, though. Hades!" He rose and crossed the room to the fireplace, where he kicked the coals with unnecessary violence. Then he sighed heavily, and picked up a photograph which stood upon the mantelpiece. Joan had spoken nothing but the truth when she told Hughie that he would discover his true feelings as soon as he found himself away from her. For six or eight months he had gone about his day's work with the thoroughness and determination of his nature. He had administered the little estate of Manors, was beginning to dabble in politics, had taken up rowing again, and was trying to interest himself generally in the course of life to which he had looked forward so eagerly on his travels. He had even tried conclusions with a few _débutantes_ who had been introduced to his notice by business-like Mammas. But whatever his course of life, his thoughts and desires persisted in centring round a single object,--a very disturbing and elusive object,--and try as he would, he failed to derive either pleasure or profit from his present existence. In other words, he had made a mess of a love-affair. Most men--and most women too, for that matter--undergo this experience at least once in their lives, and no two ever endure it in the same way. One rants, another mopes, a third forgets, a fourth bides his time, a fifth seeks consolation elsewhere, a sixth buries himself in work or dissipation. Hughie, who cherished a theory that everything ultimately comes right in this world provided you hold on long enough, and that when in doubt a man should "stand by the Day's Work and await instructions," like Kipling's Bridge-Builders, had gone steadily on, because it was his nature so to do. It was uphill work at present,--a mechanical perfunctory business, with no reward or alleviation in sight,--but he was determined to go on doing his duty by Joan to the best of his ability, and combine so far as he was able the incompatible _rôles_ of stern guardian, undesired suitor, and--to him most paradoxical of all--familiar friend. For there was no doubt that Joan liked him. She trusted him, consulted him,--yea, obeyed him, even when he contradicted her most preposterous utterances and put down a heavy foot on her most cherished enterprises. For this he did without flinching. The fact that he was a failure as a lover seemed to be no reason why he should fail as a guardian.