When we returned to the drawing-room I played and sang to them till late, and left the house high in the good graces of both women. From that moment my position in the house at South Kensington became a much more intimate one. Even two women as independent by nature as Mrs. Gascoyne and her niece found it pleasant and convenient to have a young man about who was ready to take so much trouble off their hands. This was, of course, not so apparent till the first months of mourning were over, but when Miss Gascoyne, who was devoted to music and art, began to go to concerts and picture-galleries I was very useful. I learned that Lord and Lady Gascoyne had called on Mrs. Gascoyne and her niece, and that the three were going to dine with them. I sincerely hoped that my name would not be mentioned, as I had no wish for the head of the family to know of my existence till I had decided on my plan of action. I had been inquiring cautiously about Ughtred Gascoyne, and had made a point of coming across him several times in the districts he haunted. He was a very good-looking man, with apparently no such mentality as provoked restlessness. He enjoyed his life thoroughly, for all I could see. He had been in the Guards. He had also sat in the House of Commons for a limited period, and had utterly declined to repeat the experiment. In fact, the two ventures, together with a short period of Court life, had in his own eyes been activity enough, and he had settled down to a life of ease. Having a good income of his own, and being welcome at Hammerton as often as he chose to go there, existence was altogether a pleasant affair. Still, fifty-five is young for a man nowadays, and he might very well marry and have a whole family of children. Selfish and apparently confirmed bachelors do very often in middle age perform a complete right-about-face, and end up as the benignant fathers of a whole troop of boys and girls. Ughtred Gascoyne had now arrived at that age when a man may by some such shock as hearing himself described as “that old bore” be driven into matrimony. At present there did not seem to be much chance of it. There was a woman in his life, however. She was an actress, Catherine Goodsall, a woman of birth, who moved in very good society, and who, being neither a great tragedienne nor a great comedienne, managed to earn a salary larger than could be achieved by cleverer and more legitimate artistes on account of the extraordinary _chic_ and distinction she could import into the delineation of smart society women. She was so much the real thing, so entirely free from the metallic artificiality of the usual impersonator of such characters, that managers sought her continually.