We were walking up and down the drive. It was a warm, damp morning and the trees shaken by the mild southwester shed their leaves around us in a golden shower; and the leaves that had fallen lay sodden on the grass borders. Here and there a surviving blossom of antirrhinum swaggered among its withered brethren as if to maintain the illusion of summer. A partridge or two whirred across the path from copse to meadow. The gentle sadness of the autumn day had moved her to discourse on the mutability of mundane things. Hence, by chain of association, I suppose, her sudden remark. "I don't want to go," she replied. "I should like to stay in the dreamy peace of Northlands for ever. But I have been a pet for such a long time--for years, and I've shown myself to be such a bad pet--biting the hand that fed me." I bade her not talk foolishly. She moved her small shoulder. "It's true. While the three of you--you and Barbara and Jaffery--were doing for me what has never been done for another human being, I was all the time snarling and snapping. I can't make out how you can bear the sight of me." She clenched her hands and straightened her arms down tense. "The thought of it scorches me," she cried suddenly. "Whatever you did, dear," said I, "was so natural; and we understood it all. How could we blame you?" We had, in fact, blamed her on many occasions, not being as gods to whom human hearts are open books; but this was not the occasion on which to tell her so. I don't like the devil being called the father of lies. I am convinced that the discoverer of mendacity was a warm-hearted philanthropist, who has never received due credit, and that the devil having seized hold of his discovery perverted it to his own diabolical uses. It is the sort of plagiaristic thing that devils, whether they promote ancient Gehennas or modern companies, have been doing since the world began. "That doesn't make it any the easier to me," said Doria. "The horrible things I said and did--the ghastliness of it--" "My dear girl," I interrupted, as kindly as I could. "Don't let this mere fringe of tragedy worry you." She laughed shrilly, with a set, white face; which is the most unmirthful kind of laugh you can imagine.