“Not at Mr. Bengough’s?” “Certainly not!” he repeated, with indignation. Was the woman mad? An usher? Good heavens! “I know your name,” she said slowly. “But——” “I came from London the day before yesterday. I am staying at the White Lion, and I am late of the 14th Dragoons.” She raised her eyebrows. “Oh, indeed,” she said. “Is that so? Well,” rubbing a little of the powder from her nose with a needlecase, and looking at him very shrewdly, “I think,” she continued, “that that is the answer to your question.” Vaughan stared. “I do not understand you,” he said. “Then I must speak more plainly. Were you an usher at Mr. Bengough’s your civility—civility, I think you called it?—to my assistant had passed very well, Mr. Vaughan. But the civility of a gentleman, late of the 14th Dragoons, fresh from London, and staying at the White Lion, to a young person in Miss Smith’s position is apt, as in this case—eh?—to lead to misconstruction.” “You do me an injustice!” he said, reddening to the roots of his hair. “Possibly, possibly,” Miss Sibson said. But on that, without warning, she gave way to a fit of silent laughter, which caused her portly form to shake like a jelly. It was a habit with her, attributed by some to her private view of Mrs. Chapone’s famous letters on the improvement of the mind; by others, to that knowledge of the tricks and turns of her sex with which thirty years of schoolkeeping had endowed her. No doubt the face of rueful resentment with which Arthur Vaughan regarded her did not shorten the fit. But at last, “Young gentleman,” she said, “you do not deceive me! You did not come here to-day merely to hear an old woman make an apology.” He tried to maintain an attitude of dignified surprise. But her jolly laugh, her shrewd red face were too much for him. His eyes fell. “Upon my honour,” he said, “I meant nothing.” She shook with fresh laughter. “It is just of that I complain, sir,” she said. “You can trust me.” “I can trust Miss Smith,” she retorted, shaking her head. “Her I know, though our acquaintance is of the shortest. Still, I know her from top to toe. You, young gentleman, I don’t know. Mind,” she continued, with good-nature, “I don’t say that you meant any harm when you came to-day. But I’ll wager you thought that you’d see her.” Vaughan laughed out frankly. Her humour had conquered him. “Well,” he said audaciously, “and am I not to see her?” Miss Sibson looked at him, and rubbed a little more powder from her nose. “Umph!” she said doubtfully. “If I knew you I’d know what to say to that. A pretty girl, eh?” she added with her head on one side. He smiled. “And a good one! And if you were the usher at Mr. Bengough’s I’d ask no more, but I’d send for her. But——” She stopped. Vaughan said nothing, but a little out of countenance looked at the floor. “Just so, just so,” Miss Sibson said, as quietly as if he had answered her. “Well, I am afraid I must not send for her.”