Helbeck laid down his book on his knee with a little laugh. "She would have liked to get in a scolding, but we won't give her the chance." The reverie that followed was not a very pleasant one. He seemed to see Miss Fountain in the large rustic room, with a bevy of young men about her--young fellows in Sunday coats, with shiny hair and limbs bursting out of their ill-fitting clothes. There would be loud talking and laughter, rough jokes that would make her wince, compliments that would disgust her--they not knowing how to take her, nor she them. She would be wholly out of her place--a butt for impertinence--perhaps worse. And there would be a certain sense of dragging a lady from her sphere--of making free with the old house and the old family. He thought of it with disgust. He was an aristocrat to his fingers' ends. But how could it have been helped? And when he remembered her as she stood there in the hall, so young and pretty, so eager for her pleasure, he said to himself with sudden heartiness: "Nonsense! I hope the child has enjoyed herself." It was the first time that, even in his least formal thoughts, he had applied such a word to her. Silence again. The wind breathed gently round the house. He could hear the river rushing. Once he thought there was a sound of wheels and he went to the outer door, but there was nothing. Overhead the stars shone, and along the track of the river lay a white mist. As he was turning back to the hall, however, he heard voices from the mist--a loud man's voice, then a little cry as of some one in fright or anger, then a song. The rollicking tune of it shouted into the night, into the stately stillness that surrounded the old house, had the abruptest, unseemliest effect. Helbeck ran down the steps. A dog-cart with lights approached the gateway in the low stone enclosure before the house. It shot through so fast and so awkwardly as to graze the inner post. There was another little cry. Then, with various lurches and lunges, the cart drove round the gravel, and brought up somewhere near the steps. Hubert Mason jumped down. "Who's that? Mr. Helbeck? O Lord! glad to see yer, I'm sure! There's that little silly--she's been making such a' fuss all the way--thought I was going to upset her into the river, I do believe. She would try and get at the reins, though I told her it was the worst thing to do, whatever--to be interfering with the driver. Lord! I thought she'd have used the whip to me!" And Mason stood beside the shafts, with his arms on the side, laughing loudly and looking at Laura. "Stand out of the way, sir!" said Helbeck sternly, "and let me help Miss Fountain." "Oh! I say!--Come now, I'm not going to stand you coming it over me twice in the same sort--not I," cried the young man with a violent change of tone. "_You_ get out of the way, d--mn you! I brought Miss Fountain home, and she's my cousin--so there!--not yours."