Mrs. Beresford was better in the evening, and came down to dinner, putting on one of her prettiest dresses in honour of the return. ‘I have worn nothing but grey alpaca for months,’ she said; ‘like you, Cherry; I am quite glad to get out of it, and feel at home again. We have had rather a long spell of honeymooning this time, and we were beginning to get tired of each other; but it was the last, you know, for Cara is to go with us next year.’ Cara, who was sitting by, began to speak. ‘If----,’ she said, and then stopped, arrested in spite of herself by such a passionate look as she had never seen before in her father’s eyes. ‘If--what? You think I shall change my mind? Ah, Mr. Maxwell, how do you do! Am I feeling strong? Well, not strong, perhaps, but very well to-night. I have ups and downs. And poor James there, whom I have punished severely, will tell you I have grown the most fanciful, troublesome, capricious woman. James!’ He had taken Cara into a corner, and was whispering to her in a voice which made the child tremble: ‘If you say a word! if you vex your mother or frighten her with that idiotic sincerity of yours, by Heaven I’ll kill you!’ he said, clenching his hand. ‘Capricious! Yes, you never saw anything like it, Maxwell. Such a round as she has led me--such a life as I have had!’ And he laughed. Heaven help them! they all laughed, pretending to see the joke. While the child in the corner, her little frame thrilling in every nerve with that strange, violent whisper, the first roughness that had ever come her way, sat staring at the group in a trance of wonder. What did it mean? Why were they false all of them, crying when she was not there, pretending to laugh as soon as they turned to her. It was Cara’s first introduction to the mysteries of life.