In the circumstances, therefore, the Major was not sorry his daughter had had an invitation to spend a holiday at Haredale Park. He had thought of inviting himself also, but his new commission put that out of the question. After he had finished his breakfast he helped himself to a liberal dose of brandy and soda, and had just lighted his first cigar when his daughter came in. "You are very late," she said with playful fondness. "I declare you grow worse and worse." "Not my fault, my dear," the Major protested. "These things are inevitable amongst newspaper men. I thought I should be at home by eleven, but something important turned up at the last moment and they told me off to attend to it. They are good enough to say they can depend on me, Alice. That is one of the advantages of being steady. If anything goes wrong at the office the first thing they say is, 'Where is Carden?'" Alice smiled affectionately. To her this was quite natural. For a girl who had spent so many years in London she was wonderfully simple. "I suppose it can't be helped," she said. "How few men there are who would have endured your misfortunes and turned to and made a living as you are doing! I wish I were clever." "Oh, so you are, my dear, so you are," the Major said magnanimously. "The great thing is pluck and perseverance. Without egotism, I think I am endowed with those qualities, and to some extent so are you, and you will make a name as an artist yet. Stick to it, my child, stick to it. At the same time, it is good to have an occasional change, and I am glad you are going to Haredale Park. I suppose you can manage to put your painting pupils off for a week or two? Probably you will find it lonely when I am away. I shall only be able to run over from the Continent occasionally." "Oh, I shall miss you," Alice said. "But I shall be safe enough. The landlady is always motherly, and she will see I come to no harm." The Major dismissed the subject with a flourish of his cigar. He had rather feared his daughter might give way to tears. He thought she might ask him to take her along with him and so put him to the pain of refusal. Possibly the girl was looking too eagerly forward to her visit to Haredale Park to think of anything else. She had not forgotten the days when Major Carden was a man of position and they occupied a fine house in the country, when she had her horse and plunged into the dear delights of country life. It was good to feel she was going back to it, even though it was only for a little time. She had already made her modest preparations. She only hoped there would not be too many visitors at Haredale Park. But May Haredale had assured her they lived very quietly and had not many friends. "I am getting nervous about it," she said. "It will seem so different to the life I have been leading here. If I had only foreseen this I might have saved up and bought myself another dress or two. Still, I know I shall enjoy myself."