The little woman watched her closely from the corner of her bright eyes, and she was terribly alarmed. She had had no idea until now what a formidable person this Roden Dalrymple was. The girl was in a quiver of excitement from head to foot. She wandered restlessly about the room, vaguely fiddling at the furniture and ornaments; she could not control her agitation. John brought in the teapot, and Mrs. Reade peeled her gloves from her small white hands, and rolling them into a soft ball, tossed them down amongst the cups and saucers. She began to pour out the tea in silence, wondering what in the world she had better do. The silence was broken by the sound of carriage wheels crunching up the drive. Rachel came to a standstill in the middle of the room, and listened with a rigid intensity of expectation that was quite as painful to her companion as her more demonstrative emotion had been. They heard the bustle of Mrs. Hardy's arrival, heard John open the front door, heard the sweep of silken draperies in the hall. And then they heard a familiar voice, raised several notes above its ordinary pitch. "John!" "Yes'm." "When did this gentleman call?" "About an hour after you left'm." "Did you tell him we were all out?" "Yes'm. And he'll call again to-morrow, he says." "Oh, indeed--will he! You'll just tell him, _whenever_ he calls, that I am not at home, John--that _nobody_ is at home. Do you hear? That gentleman is not to be admitted." "Oh, you stupid woman!" Mrs. Reade sighed to herself, not meaning to be disrespectful, but grudging to see delicate work marred by inartistic hands. And then she looked at Rachel, and realised the catastrophe that had occurred. All the colour had gone out of the sensitive face, all its agitation, all the soft, submissive tenderness that had characterised it hitherto. She looked straight before her, with stern eyes full of indignant passion, and with her lips set in a hard, thin line. The meek little child, who had been so easy to manage, was going to assert the rights of womanhood, and to take the conduct of her affairs into her own hands. CHAPTER VIII. "THE LIGHT THAT NEVER WAS ON SEA OR LAND." Mr. Dalrymple was in Melbourne for almost the whole of the time that he had intended to spare from his partner and his property in Queensland, which was nearly three weeks, and he never once succeeded in communicating with Rachel, which was the special mission on which he had come down. He called at the Toorak house again and again, and was always told that the ladies were not at home. There was not much else that he could do at this stage of courtship, knowing nothing of Rachel's circumstances in connection with Mr. Kingston, and having had no definite assurances of her disposition towards himself; but he did this persistently, until he became suddenly aware that Mrs. Hardy did not mean to admit him.