"So, if I may, I'll settle provisionally to be with you next Friday," said the letter. It went on--and Bernadette also went on composedly--"So there ought to be nothing in the way of our making the motor excursion I suggested one day in the following week, if you've a mind for it then." She folded up the letter, laid it beside her, took a sip of coffee, and caught Judith's eyes regarding her with what seemed like an amused admiration. Her own glance in return was candid and simple. "I'm afraid I forget what his excursion was to be, but it doesn't matter." "I haven't had my excursion yet," Arthur complained. "The fact is we've done hardly anything since I came." "Well, you shall have yours to-morrow, if it's fine," Bernadette promised. "For how long does Oliver Wyse propose to honour us?" asked Godfrey, glowering and glum at the other end of the table. "I really don't exactly know. A week or so, I should think." Godfrey grunted surlily. "A week too much!" the grunt plainly said. He turned to Arthur. "Yes, you'd better get your excursion while you can. When Wyse is here, we none of us get much chance at the car." Saintliness ignored the grumble. Arthur fidgeted under it. "If you want the car, I'm sure I don't want to take it from you, Godfrey," he said rather hotly. "Oh, I spoke in your interest. I'm not likely to be asked to go on a motor excursion!" "You wouldn't go for the world, if you were asked," said Judith. "It'll hold us all. Anybody can come who likes," remarked Bernadette meekly. "That's a very pressing invitation, isn't it?" Godfrey growled to Arthur, asking his sympathy. Little scenes like this were frequent now, though Oliver Wyse's name was not often dragged into them; Godfrey shrank from doing that often, for fear of defiance and open war. More commonly it was just a sneer at Bernadette, a "damper" administered to her merriment. But Arthur resented it all, and came to fear it, so that he no longer sought his cousin's company on walks or in his study, but left him to his own melancholy devices. The unhappy man, sensitive as he was, saw the change in a moment and hailed a new grievance; his own kinsman now his wife was setting against him!