But she is not offended. Her eye, flattered by her shaven lawn, cannot rest very severely upon him who has shaven it for her. Her spirits have risen; exhilarated by the wholesome exercise, by the sunshine, by who knows what. Only when her look falls now and again upon Prue, still flung listlessly on the garden-seat, with her nosegay--not more flagging than she--withering on the ground beside her, does a cloud come over it. 'Should I get a good character from your last place?' returns she playfully. 'From the Foreign Office?' 'Was it the Foreign Office?' with a momentary impulse of curiosity for which she instantly pulls herself up. 'You know one always expects to get a character from the last place.' 'I do not know whether it is a good one. It is a nine-years' one.' Then they set off again. Next time it is about Prue. 'I hope she is not ill?' his eyes following Margaret's to the little forlorn figure under the Judas-tree. 'No-o.' 'Nor unhappy?' 'We all have our Black Mondays'--evasively--'only some of us have Black Tuesdays and Black Wednesdays as well--ah!' What has happened to her? Her gloomy sentence has ended in a suppressed cry of joy, and her cheeks have changed from pink to damask. He turns to seek the cause of this metamorphosis. 'Why, there is Ducane!' In an instant his eyes have pounced back upon her face. It is settling again into its pretty normal colours, but the joy is still there. 'Yes, there is Freddy!' she acquiesces softly. A sharp needle of jealousy pricks his heart. This, then, is why she received him so frigidly. She was expecting the other. 'We stop now, I suppose?' he says abruptly. 'What! tired already, Jacob's would-be successor?' asks she rallyingly. 'Hardly. But I supposed that you would wish to stop.' 'On account of Freddy?'--with a little shrug. 'Pooh! he is a fly on the wall; and besides, he--he is not coming this way.' It is true. Straight as a die young Ducane is making for the Judas-tree; and from under that Judas-tree a little figure, galvanised back into youth and bloom, rises, walking on air to meet him. The eyes of John and Margaret meet, and he understands. As he goes home he feels that he has made a real step in advance this time. He shares a secret with her. He knows about Prue! CHAPTER X 'Our Master hath a garden which fair flowers adorn, There will I go and gather, both at eve and morn: Nought's heard therein but Angel Hymns with harp and lute, Loud trumpets and bright clarions, and the gentle, soothing flute. 'The lily white that bloometh there is Purity, The fragrant violet is surnamed Humility: Nought's heard therein but Angel Hymns with harp and lute, Loud trumpets and bright clarions, and the gentle, soothing flute.' 'Well,' cries Peggy anxiously, as, the young men having taken leave, she sees her sister come running and jumping, and humming an air, to meet her, 'is it all right?'