‘Good morning, Miss Askam,’ Ada replied, her eyes roving anxiously over all the details of the other’s costume. ‘How do you do? I hope you are very well,’ she added, deciding within her own mind that Miss Askam ‘dressed very plain and dark, and all one colour—just a plain, dark brown. I do like a little brightness.’ ‘I am very well, thank you,’ said Eleanor, utterly unconscious of this scrutiny. ‘Have you been to Miss Wynter’s again lately?’ ‘Yes, Miss Askam. I go there pretty often. Once or twice a week, at any rate. Miss Wynter and I are great friends.’ ‘Oh. And how are your songs getting on? Those which you are preparing for the concert, I mean!’ ‘Oh, thank you, very well. I’m almost perfect in them now.’ ‘Perhaps you would like to sit down. I felt tired; it is such a mild morning,’ said Eleanor, making room on the bench. Ada promptly sat down. ‘I was feeling a little tired,’ she replied, with an air of languor; ‘really, the weather is not at all seasonable.’ ‘No; but do you like frost? I do; but you don’t look to me as if you could stand much of that sort of thing.’ ‘Oh, I’m not particularly delicate, thank you—never very strong, but I always keep going, somehow,’ said Ada. ‘I haven’t seen you at Balder Hall, lately,’ she added, to Eleanor’s great astonishment. ‘That is not surprising, as I have not been there since the day I saw you,’ she answered, indifferently. ‘Are you going to sing that same song at the concert?’ she added. ‘No, not that one. I take part in a duet with Miss Wynter.’ ‘I see. Not so trying, quite, as having to stand up alone. I saw you were a little nervous that afternoon; but one soon gets over that when one has once started.’ ‘Oh, thank you, there’s no call to pity me,’ said Ada, with a lofty smile. ‘I’m accustomed to singing before gentlemen.’ ‘Oh, I don’t mean that exactly,’ said Eleanor, astounded to find the construction put upon her words. ‘What a queer little self-sufficient, ill-bred thing it is!’ she reflected to herself. ‘How sad that Mr. Camm should be so blind!’ For she had heard a great deal about Roger Camm at the Vicarage, and from the doctor, whom she had seen once or twice in the last few days. ‘It did not matter in the least,’ went on Ada, anxious to vindicate herself from the charge of nervousness. ‘When one has to sing in public, it would never do to get nervous before one’s friends.’