A moment's silence. Whom then could she have lured into her toils? Freddy? But Freddy must be with Prue. Mr. Evans? the diplomate? There is not much choice. Her speculations are again broken in upon by the voice: 'Will not you take a turn?' 'I think not; that is to say'--correcting herself--'I shall only go a few steps, just to find my sister.' 'May I help you to find her?' 'I do not know why I should give you that trouble.' A moment's silence, spent by both in reflections. This is the outcome of his. 'I do not think that I have done anything fresh.' 'Anything fresh?' 'Not since we parted; nothing to earn me a new set of snubs.' She smiles a little. 'You have not had much time.' 'And I will not do anything fresh.' Then aside, 'I am blessed if I know what I did.' 'That is rather a rash engagement,' smiling again. It is fortunate that her teeth are so good, for she shows a great many of them. 'But if I keep it I may come?' pertinaciously. 'I suppose so;' and out they step together. It cannot be helped, but it is a little perverse of fate that, after all, it should be she who, in appearance at least, is the one to philander in the moonlight with this despiser of the marriage law. And whether or no it is his presence that brings her ill-luck, it is some time before she succeeds in the object of her search. The grounds are rather large, with meandering walks and great clumps of shrubs that hide them from one another. Each of Prue's favourite resorts has been visited, but without result. The walled garden, hushed and sleeping; the trellised wall, where ancient brick has disappeared beneath the thronged faces, diversely dazzling, of the brown, orange, tawny and sulphur nasturtiums; the retired seat beneath the tulip-tree. All, all are empty. Nothing remains but the kiosk, and Peggy feels sure that Prue is not in the kiosk. Thither, however, they bend their steps; but before they reach it a turn of the walk reveals to them two seated figures. One is certainly the Prue whom they seek; Prue sitting upon an uncomfortable garden bench, on which nobody ever sits--on which she herself has never sat before. But is it conceivable that, since dinner, Freddy can have doubled in size, can have lost all the hair off the top of his head, and have exchanged his cambric shirt-front and his diamond and turquoise studs for a double-breasted waistcoat buttoned to the chin?