“Did you see Lord Gascoyne?” “No.” “He was there when I called, and seemed terribly upset. He kept on saying, ‘Poor Uncle Ughtred!’ and ‘He was the life and soul of everything.’” I could not see that these remarks of Lord Gascoyne’s were very illuminating or helpful, but it is curious how little people trouble to be sensible when they are talking of the dead. Miss Gascoyne pressed my hand as I said good-night. “What a friend you are! You are always cheering us. You knew him, too, which makes it all the nicer of you to be so cheerful.” “Good-night,” I said, and then threw into my glance a confession of admiration for which I had been months preparing the way. I was sure that had I ventured on such a thing a year before she would have felt anger, born of injured pride, but now her eyes fell, and I knew that I was on the road to success. She had taken me at my own valuation, as I had intended she should. Chapter XV I was glad to discover that Ughtred Gascoyne had left all his little fortune, excepting such as did not return to the Gascoyne coffers, to Catherine Goodsall, and that she would be quite well off. She looked very woebegone when I saw her again, but she was not a pessimist, and soon pulled herself together; not that I believe she ever forgot him. She gave me a tie-pin that had belonged to him, because he had been very fond of me, and had often talked of me to her. A Sunday or two afterwards I lunched with Sibella and her husband. The old hunger for her was beginning to grow on me, and impel me towards her. They were for a wonder alone, and Lionel looked discontented. He had evidently reached the frame of mind peculiar to vulgar folk, who think that unless they are living at high pressure and constantly entertaining or being entertained by those they consider great they are dropping out of it. Great folk can afford their holidays, but such social climbers as Lionel Holland can have no respite from the treadmill of entertainment. I think he was verily too stupid to see that it was his wife’s beauty and charm, lacking in depth though they were, to which they owed their improved position. Sir Anthony Cross—who I knew was with them constantly—must have played a very clever game, a much cleverer game than I had imagined him capable of. To do Lionel justice, he was not the sort of man to play the complaisant husband for the sake of any position, and he had evidently not grasped that Sir Anthony’s presence at their house was solely and entirely due to admiration of his wife. I was certain that so far Sir Anthony had not even been permitted to declare himself. Sibella was vain enough of his attention to keep him dangling after her, but she had no notion of making herself cheap to the men of a society the women of which she was anxious to propitiate.