Saying good-night to each other, for it was growing late, Frank departed, and Daisy went in. Her mother was shut up in the drawing-room, and she went on straight to her sister's chamber. There an unpleasant scene awaited her. Lydia, not yet in bed--for she had refused to go, and had abused Tabitha for urging it--lay back still in the easy-chair. Could looks have annihilated, Daisy would certainly have sunk from those cast on her by Lydia, as she entered. And then the storm began. Lydia reproached her in no measured terms, and with utter scorn of tone and manner, for the "clandestine intimacy," as she was pleased to call it, that she, Daisy, was carrying on with Frank Raynor. It appeared that after the candles were lighted, and Mrs. St. Clare had gone down, Lydia, declining to go to bed, and wanting to be amused, required Daisy to read to her again. Tabitha was sent in search of Daisy, and came back saying she could not find her anywhere: she was not downstairs, she was not in her chamber. "Go and look in the garden, you stupid thing," retorted Lydia: "you know Miss Daisy's for ever out there." Tabitha--a meek woman in demeanour, who took abuse humbly--went to the garden as directed, searched, and at length came upon Miss Daisy in the avenue, pacing it on the arm of Mr. Raynor. Back she went, and reported it to Lydia. And now Lydia was reproaching her. "To suffer yourself to meet that man clandestinely after night has fallen!" reiterated Lydia. "And to stay out with him!--and to take his arm! You disgraceful girl! And when, all the while, he does not care one jot for _you!_ He loves some one else." Daisy had received the tirade on herself in silence, but she fired up at this. "You have no right to say _that_, Lydia," she cried. "Whether he loves me, or not, I shall not say; but, at any rate, he does not love any one else." "Yes, he does," affirmed Lydia. "He does not," fired Daisy. "If he does, who is it?" "No one in his own station--more shame to him! It is that girl they call so beautiful--who lost her father. Rose--Rose--what's the name?--Rosaline Bell. Frank Raynor loves her with his whole heart and soul." "Lydia, how dare you say such a thing?" "_I_ don't say it. I only repeat it. Ask Trennach. It is known all over the place. They used to be always together--walking on the Bare Plain by night. The girl has gone away for a time; and the gentleman, during her absence, amuses himself with you. Makes love to you to keep his hand in."