"Is there _no_ truth in it, Oliver?" "None in the least." "But you do go there very often!" Then Oliver achieved a masterpiece of diplomacy. "My dear Ethel," he said, "I will go there no more until you go with me. I will not set foot in the house again." He knew very well that Mr. Brooke would not admit him. It was clever to make a virtue of necessity. "No, no, please don't do that! Go as often as you please." "It was simply out of kindness to a lonely girl. I played her accompaniments for her sometimes, and listened to her singing. But as you dislike it, Ethel, I promise you that I will go there no more." "Oh, Oliver, forgive me! I don't doubt you a bit. Do go to see Lesley as often as you can. I should _like_ you to do it. Go for my sake." But Oliver was quite obdurate. No, he would not go to the Brookes' again, since Ethel had once objected to his going. And on this pinnacle of austere virtue he remained, thereby reducing Ethel to a state of self-abasement, which spoke well for his chances of mastery in the married life which loomed before him. CHAPTER XXII. LADY ALICE'S PHILANTHROPY. Meanwhile, Lady Alice Brooke, in pursuit of her new fancy for philanthropy and the sick poor, had wandered somewhat aimlessly into other wards beside those set apart for women and children--at first the object of her search. She strayed--I use the word "strayed" designedly, for she certainly did not do it of set purpose--with one of the nurses into accident wards, into the men's wards, where her flowers and fruits and gentle words made her welcome, and where the bearded masculine faces, worn sometimes by pain and privation of long standing, appealed to her sensibilities in a new and not altogether unpleasant way.