"Oh, why did you break the spell?" cried Austin, regretfully. "What harm could it have done you? You said yourself just now that nothing happens that isn't natural. And this is natural enough, if one could only understand the way it works." "Many things are natural that are not desirable," returned St Aubyn, walking up and down. "It's quite natural for people to go to sea, but it makes some of them sea-sick, nevertheless, and they had better stay on shore. It's all a matter of temperament, I suppose, and what is pleasant for you is something that my own instincts warn me very carefully to avoid." Austin drew his handkerchief across his eyes, as though beginning to come back to the realities of life. "I daresay," he said, vaguely. "But it's very restful here. The air seems to make me sleepy. I almost think--" At this point a servant appeared at the other end of the hall, and St Aubyn went to see what he wanted. The next moment he returned, with quickened steps. "Come away with you--you and your spooks!" he cried, cheerfully, taking Austin by the arm. "Here's an old aunt of mine suddenly dropped from the skies, and clamouring for a cup of tea. We must go in and entertain her. She's all by herself in the library." "I shall be very glad," said Austin. "You go on first, and I'll be with you in two minutes." So St Aubyn strode off to welcome his elderly relative, and when Austin came into the room he found his friend stooping over a very small, very dowdy old lady dressed in rusty black silk, with a large bonnet rather on one side, who was standing on tiptoe, the better to peck at St Aubyn's cheek by way of a salute. She had small, twinkling eyes, a wrinkled face, and the very honestest wig that Austin had ever seen; and yet there was an air and a style about the old body which somehow belied her quaint appearance, and suggested the idea that she was something more than the insignificant little creature that she looked at first sight. And so in fact she was, being no less a personage than the Dowager-Countess of Merthyr Tydvil, and a very great lady indeed. "But, my dear aunt, why did you never let me know that I might expect you?" St Aubyn was saying as Austin entered. "I might have been miles away, and you'd have had all your journey for nothing." "My dear, I'm staying with the people at Cleeve Castle, and I thought I'd just give 'em the slip for an hour or two and take you by surprise," answered the old lady as she sat down. "No, you needn't ring--I ordered tea as soon as I came in. They just bore me out of my life, you see, and they've got a pack o' riffraff staying with 'em that I don't know how to sit in the same room with. But who's your young friend over there? Why don't you introduce him?" "I beg your pardon!" said St Aubyn. "Mr Austin Trevor, a near neighbour of mine. Austin, my aunt, Lady Merthyr Tydvil."