"No. By-the-bye, I think the Bishop _did_ say man. But, of course, he would speak scripturally. Besides, all gentlemen are men too, but all women are not ladies." The curl died very slowly on Judith's lip, if at all. "Poor Mr. Challis!" said she. "He doesn't know what he's losing--at least, what he _would_ lose if it wasn't for Bishop Barham's respect for the World. Fancy having the Holy Communion refused one--by Bishop Barham!..." "Judith! If you're going to blaspheme!..." "I'm not, dear. I'm going to say good-night. And to-morrow I'll tell Mr. Challis of his parlous plight." "Oh, Ju, you never will!" "Wait and see! Good-night, dear." The "dear" was rather perfunctory. And it was not to correct it to tenderness that Judith turned back in the doorway and reclosed it from within. "I want to know what you meant by 'the usual thing,'" she said, and waited. "I thought you said you didn't think it mattered." "I don't think it does. But I want to know what you meant by it, just the same." The return into the room to ask the question added to its weight somehow. Sibyl might have answered more forcibly and less pertly had it been asked during conversation. "I should have thought, after the Honourable Stephen, that that went without saying." "'After the Honourable Stephen'!... Sibyl!" There is growing resentment in the handsome woman's voice of protest, and a slight flinching in her sister's manner recognizes it. She speaks uncomfortably. "Well, what would you have me say? You know quite well, Ju, that the _madre_ thinks so too. What is the use of pretending?" Judith's colour is heightened as she closes the door to prevent someone hearing in the passage--her maid perhaps or her sister's. "_I_ see no use in pretending, Sib. If you and mamma are going to say spiteful and malicious things, you had better speak them out.... Yes, it _is_ spiteful and malicious to try to make out that there was anything between me and Stephen Lyell; it is simply wicked to use the word flirtation.... No--I know you have not actually used it--but it's the same thing. It was that woman entirely! And you know it!"