She took the chair he offered her, and sat down; and then Otho, taking no further present notice of her, turned to Ada, and, under Magdalen’s eyes, proceeded to inaugurate a flirtation with the young girl, in the most outrageously bad taste, and with a persistency and determination from which, as Magdalen very well saw, a more resolute girl than Ada could with difficulty have withdrawn herself. The only method of resistance would have been for the object of his attentions to close her lips, and entirely refuse to converse with him; and that, of course, was a method which did not for a moment occur to Ada, whose inflammable vanity, utterly unbalanced by common sense, took fire at his attentions, and construed them into proofs of the most flattering regard. Magdalen sat quite passive under this behaviour until the choir had gone to the concert-room, to sing their glee about ‘the oak and the ash, and the bonny ivy tree,’ and then she said, coldly and deliberately— ‘Ada, I want to speak to you.’ ‘Oh, never mind her!’ said Otho, carelessly, almost contemptuously. ‘A sermon should not come before a song, especially such a song as Miss Dixon is going to give us.’ But old habit was yet strong in Ada. Never before had Miss Wynter addressed her without receiving instant and profound attention, and she received it now. Ada gave it almost instinctively. ‘What is it, Miss Wynter?’ she asked. ‘Only this, that I don’t know what Mr. Askam means by behaving as he is doing, and I am quite sure you do not; but one thing is certain,—that Mr. Roger Camm will be here directly, and I would advise you to moderate your transports, and behave a little more like a reasonable being before he comes.’ ‘Roger Camm, indeed!’ exclaimed Ada, nettled. ‘He’s not my master yet, nor ever will be, Miss Wynter. He may come twenty times for aught I care.’ Never before had she addressed Magdalen in such a tone. It would appear that the latter was in earnest in her remonstrance, for she now appealed to Otho. ‘Listen to me, Otho. If you are conducting yourself in this way in order to vex me, you have quite succeeded. I’m ready to own it, and I will give you whatever explanation you like after this is over; but for heaven’s sake go back into the concert-room before Roger Camm comes. You have no right to behave as you are doing, and he will very speedily let you know that he thinks so.’ ‘Right!’ exclaimed Otho, with a laugh. ‘I never ask about right. I do what I have a fancy for.’ ‘Pray what harm can Roger say of me?’ said Ada pettishly. ‘I would rather ask, what good he can say of you, if you let him see you making yourself ridiculous in this fashion. In any case, you belong to him, and——’ ‘Not yet!’ exclaimed both Otho and Ada in one voice. Magdalen looked at them both, and showed what was with her a rare sign, betokening strong emotion—a heightened colour in her cheeks.