"I don't know that it's really my concern. I don't know that it's any of our...." A pause here is due to his duty to syntax.... "I mean to say--that it is the business of any one of us. Miss Arkroyd is no chicken. In fact, I'm not sure that her age won't stand in her way--for training, I mean. However, of course I shall take care that her family knows all about it." Challis's voice sounded well in his own ears, and he was convinced that no fault could be found with his behaviour so far. As to anyone saying he should not have made the promise about Mr. Magnus of the Megatherium while he was a trusted guest at Royd, that was sheer nonsense. He felt quite nettled with Marianne for saying, "Oh, haven't you done it?" But he wasn't going to prolong discussion about it. He felt nettled, too, with himself for feeling, when Marianne left him to read, before going to bed, the letters that had come for him--with a charge to him not to make a noise when he came up--nettled for feeling that he had got through the evening well, which was absurd; and that to do so he had assumed a certain roughness in reference to Judith, to accentuate his equable indifference to her personally, which was absurder. What was it all about?--was the question he asked himself. And then another that arose from it naturally, What was _what_ all about? The distraction afforded by a handful of miscellaneous correspondence gave him an excuse for ignoring the latter question, which, indeed, seemed to him the more unanswerable of the two. One thing, however, he was glad of having achieved. Marianne would write that letter, he felt sure. Only he would just keep his eye on her to see that she did it. He would not have to write to Judith, "Please don't come and see my wife!" in any form, transparent or otherwise. For anything the story shows at this point, Alfred Challis and Marianne might have tided over any little difficulties arising out of the visit to Royd, if they had only been judiciously let alone. It was those blessed Peacemakers! CHAPTER XI VATTED RUM CORNER, AND CHESTNUTS. A YOUNG TURK. HOW LIZARANN TOLD MOTHER GROVES OF THE FLYING DUTCHMAN. OF AN AMBULANCE, AND WHAT WAS IN IT. HOW LIZARANN WENT HOME WITHOUT DADDY