“I shall complete the work for your father, Freddy,” she said quietly. “Two or three days more will see the end. After that neither my services nor my presence will be required over there.” “You don't mean to say----” he began, unbelievingly. “It isn't likely I'd go there for pleasure, is it?” she interrupted dryly. “But think of the old times, the------” “I can think of them just as well here as anywhere else. No; I shan't annoy Mrs Brood, Freddy.” It was on the tip of her tongue to say more, but she thought better of it. “They're going abroad soon,” he ventured. “At least, that's father's plan. Yvonne isn't so keen about it. She calls this being abroad, you know. Besides,” he hurried on in his eagerness to excuse Yvonne, “she's tremendously fond of you.” Lydia was wise. “I would give a great deal to be able to really believe so, Freddy. I--I could be very fond of her.” He warmed to the cause. “No end of times she's said you were the finest------” Her smile--an odd one, such as he had never seen on her lips before--checked his eager speech. He bridled. “Of course, if you don't choose to believe me, there's nothing more to be said. She meant it, however.” “I am sure she said it, Freddy,” she hastened to declare. “Will she be pleased with our--our marriage?” It required a great deal of courage on her part to utter these words, but she was determined to bring the true situation home to him. He did not even hesitate, and there was conviction in his voice as he replied: “It doesn't matter whether she's pleased or displeased. We're pleasing ourselves, are we not? There's no one else to consider, dear.” Her eyes were full upon his, and there was wonder in them. “Thank you--thank you, Freddy,” she cried. “I--I knew you'd------” The sentence remained unfinished. “Has there ever been a doubt in your mind?” he asked uneasily, after a moment. He knew there had been misgivings, and he was ready, in his self-abasement, to resent them if given the slightest opening. Guilt made him arrogant. “No,” she answered simply. The answer was not what he expected. He flushed painfully. “I--I thought perhaps you'd--you'd get a notion in your head that------” He, too, stopped for want of the right words to express himself without committing the egregious error of letting her see that it had been in his thoughts to accuse her of jealousy. She waited for a moment. “That I might have got the notion in my head you did not love me any longer? Is that what you started to say?” “Yes,” he confessed, averting his eyes. “I've been unhappy at times, Freddy, but that is all,” she said steadily. “You see, I know how honest you really are. I know it far better than you know it yourself.” “I wonder just how honest I am,” he muttered. “I wonder what would happen if------ But nothing can happen. Nothing ever will happen. Thank you, old girl, for saying what you said just now. It's--it's bully of you.”