"He's the only one of us all without the sporting instinct, and what's worse, is bigoted against every kind of sport for others. He can't help his nature, I suppose; but oh! I _do_ wish he could understand all that the sight of the country, and growing things, and horses mean to me!" Unconsciously Gay for a long time had felt the want of a sympathetic companion, or, as she would have expressed it, a pal, for, fond as she was of her brother, he was not an ideal listener when she lived over again a great run to hounds, or described a spirited game of polo at Hurlingham. He always accorded her that polite inattention which checks confidences, and freezes enthusiasm, and Lossie Holden, Gay's cousin and enforced intimate, loathed sport in every shape and form, while Effie Bulteel, a sportswoman after Gay's own heart, was too constantly her husband's companion to have much time for anyone else. Thus, on the principle that we are nearly always furthest from those we love, Gay did not see half so much of her friend as she wished, while having to endure far more of her cousin Lossie's company than she either desired or deserved. Dismissing the subject with a shrug of her shoulders, the girl started to attend to those household duties in which she was an adept, and retired below stairs to plan out the day's food, more especially the dinner. Then she did the flowers, of which there was always a profusion in the house, for Gay was a real lover of Nature, and to watch the different gradations of colour in the spring was a constant delight to her, though when leaf and flower came to their full growth and perfection, all rushing out on the top of each other, she lost interest in, and quaintly denounced them, as "vulgar." Suddenly it occurred to her that she and Frank had not given one of their cosy little dinners for some time--why not have one soon, asking Carlton Mackrell and Chris Hannen, with the inevitable Lossie to make up the party? The Professor did not count, and in any case Gay would have found it difficult to find another girl--all those she knew were either too fast or too slow for her taste, and it must be confessed that while she bore her own sex no ill-will, she infinitely preferred the society of men. "You can never tell a woman all your secrets as you can a man," she used to say, and Lossie was fond of quoting this remark, and telling everyone that Gay hated women--the deduction being that from close personal observation of her own character, she found all her sisters as hateful as herself. Yet Gay looked no "cat" as she ran to her writing-table; in these days when the streets are filled with fine athletic woman, but the dear little girl, with her smile, her blush, her little foot and hand, her gracious ways, her thanks for some small service rendered, appears to have vanished from the haunts of men, one such girl at least, as more than one man knew, was to be found at a certain house in Connaught Square.