Vanna looked thoughtfully at the lovely face. Jean was in earnest; and to one of her warmhearted, impulsive nature to be in earnest meant to be content with no half measures, but to insist upon wholesale surrender. It would be useless to protest, and indeed she had no wish to do so. Jean's flight would not avail; the fates had decreed that she and Robert Gloucester should meet, and would not be coerced from their plan--of that she was quietly convinced; at the same time, she felt a keen sympathy with the shattering of Edith's romance, and was content that Jean should put herself beyond the reach of blame. "Oh, yes, I'd love to go," she replied. "It will be delightful to have you all to myself, and I'm in no mood for functions. But are you quite sure you won't be bored? You won't find it too lonely?" "Oh, well!" replied Jean, laughing. "Incidentally, there is Piers Rendall! He went down last week to fish, and to cheer his mother. He shall cheer us, too. Well, then, it's all settled. You'll go alone to-night, and to-morrow morning bright and early we'll set off for the sea. I wish I had not bought that white dress..." So it was arranged, and at eight o'clock that evening, Vanna entered Mrs Morton's drawing-room alone, and saw a shadow fall over Robert Gloucester's face, while Edith listened to the offered explanations with a surprise from which she loyally strove to banish any trace of relief. A shy girl of sixteen was summoned from the schoolroom to fill the vacant place at the table, and, putting aside his own disappointment, Gloucester insisted upon claiming her as his own partner, and kept her happy and amused throughout the meal. In the drawing-room his laugh was as cheery and content as if he had never known a care, and Vanna noticed that in a tactful, unobtrusive fashion he performed many of the duties overlooked by the host of the evening. It was he who observed that the draught from an open window was too strong for a delicate guest; he who turned aside from a laughing group to speak to the solitary occupant of a sofa; he who started an interesting topic of conversation, when the old showed signs of wearing thin; and the Mortons, old and young, regarded him with glowing eyes and punctuated their sentences with "Robert says," "Robert thinks," as though his opinion was sufficient to settle the most knotty point. It was towards the end of the evening, when Vanna had her first quiet word with the hero of the occasion. "What does it mean?" he asked at once. "Is it serious?" And when she queried blankly, "Her headache?" he replied, with such a transparency of distress, that she was ashamed to confess the unreality of the excuse. "Oh, no--no. Nothing serious. A very passing thing." "Then why is she leaving town so suddenly?" Vanna looked at him, and the impulse came to speak the unvarnished truth, unconventional though it might be.