"Since when?" Mrs. Brenton spoke with some irritation. "I thought you liked him so much?" "Oh, I change my mind occasionally!" She yawned again. "The fact is, I do like him sometimes, but then again I dislike him more often. You see, he bores me, and life is much--much too short to be bored...." Mrs. Brenton sat silent a moment; then she said-- "Camilla, I want to..." "No," said Camilla, "don't! I know so exactly what you want to say. I know it all by heart. He cares for me; he is _such_ a good man; it will be such a _splendid_ thing for me! Don't you suppose I can hear everybody saying this? Well, of course, it would be a splendid thing. I am not denying that; but oh! Agnes, he depresses me so horribly. When he talks to me I feel as though I were being prepared for confirmation, and he has a way of sitting and looking at me that is positively unbearable. If he only had a spice of the devil in him...." "Like Sammy, I suppose!" said Agnes Brenton drily. "Yes"--impatiently--"like Sammy or any other man who lives, and moves, and is not always up in the clouds contemplating the road to Heaven. My dear Agnes, there is no getting away from the fact that Rupert Haverford is a bore, a distinct and definite bore!" "Well," said Mrs. Brenton, "if that is your opinion of the man, I should not bother about him so much." "Now you are cross with me," said Camilla, "dear sweet old thing! Don't you know I always speak out my thoughts with you? Oh, here we are at your lodgings already! Look here, Agnes, you must let me help you with this girl. Poor soul! she must feel pretty miserable, I expect. Why not bring her in to luncheon to-morrow?" Mrs. Brenton kissed the speaker. "Why will you always try and make me believe you are what you are not?" she asked, half lightly, half sadly. "Silly Agnes," said Camilla, laughingly, "it is all your own fault; you are so anxious to make me a saint, and all the time I am very much the other thing. Good night, darling!" Mrs. Lancing's maid was waiting for her mistress, and there were some letters and a note from Sir Samuel Broxbourne. Camilla opened the note first. It was merely a reminder that she had promised to ride with him the following morning if the weather was good. Sir Samuel was, of course, lending Mrs. Lancing a horse. "I am deadly tired, but I don't believe I shall sleep a wink, Dennis. You had better give me some bromide," Camilla said, as she was made ready for bed. "If I could only be sure," she said to herself when the maid was gone; "he _seems_ just the same, and yet now and then he looks at me in rather an odd way." She caught her breath. "Sammy can be so hard! All the world knows that." She sat crouched up looking into the fire for a long time, then she shrugged her shoulders.