"Don't take it to heart," he said. "'Fondness' is a very indeterminate term, and one that you must not scrutinize too closely. This little black beast, for instance"--caressing, as he spoke, the head of the ebony-hued cat which sat upon the arm of his chair--"which I picked up half-starving in the street when it was a kitten, is fond of me because I feed it: but suppose that I were too poor to give it milk and chicken-bones, do you think it would retain any affection for me? A sublimated cupboard-love is all that we can expect now-a-days from cats--and servants." "When you can write as you do about love," said Lesley, who was coming to know her father well enough to tease him now and then, "I wonder that you dare venture to express yourself in this cold-blooded way in our hearing!" "Ah, but, my dear, I was not talking about love," said Caspar, lightly. "I was talking about 'fondness,' which is a very different matter. You did not say that your maid, Kingston, _loved_ you--I suppose she was hardly likely to go that length--you said that she was fond of you. Very probably. But fondness has its limits." Lesley smiled in reply, and did not utter the thought that occurred to her. What she really believed was that Kingston was not only "fond" of her, after the instinctive fashion of a dumb creature that one feeds, but loved her, as one woman loves another. Although her democratic feelings came to her through her father's teaching, or by inheritance from him, she did not quite like to say this to him: he might think it foolish to believe that a servant whom she had not known for very many weeks actually loved her; and yet she had the conviction that Kingston's attachment was deeper and more sincere than that of many a woman who claimed to be her friend. And she was both grieved and puzzled by Kingston's disappearance. For this was on Monday morning, and the woman had not come back to Mr. Brooke's. Great had been the astonishment of every one in the house when it was found that the quiet, well-spoken, well-behaved Mary Kingston, who had hitherto proved herself so trustworthy and so conscientious, had gone away--disappeared utterly and entirely, without leaving a word of explanation behind. She had last been seen on the pavement, shortly before midnight, assisting a lady to get into a hansom. Nobody had seen her re-enter the house. It seemed as if she had been spirited away. She had gone without a bonnet or shawl, in her plain black dress and white cap and apron, as if she meant to return in a minute or two, and she had not appeared again. The shawl that she had taken with her was not missed, for Miss Brooke continued for some time under the impression that it had been lent to one of the visitors.