Some months ago he had even ventured to tell her that he thought she gadded about a bit too much! Why couldn't she be content to stay quietly at Rosedean? "Look at me and Laura," he had exclaimed. "We hardly ever go away for a holiday, and we very seldom pay a visit!" Katty had shaken her pretty head playfully: "Ah, but you don't know how lonely I am sometimes! Laura is most dear and kind to me, but you know, Godfrey, I don't see her often----" He had not liked to remind her that he very often did. Then something happened which quite curiously quickened Godfrey Pavely's unavowed feeling for Katty. Oliver Tropenell, a virtual stranger to them all, came home from Mexico to spend the summer in England with his mother. And three times, during Oliver's first fortnight in England, Godfrey arrived at Rosedean to find the then stranger there. On these three occasions each man had tried to sit the other out, and finally they had left the house together. As a result of these meetings Godfrey soon caught himself wondering with a mixture of feelings he did not care to analyse, whether Tropenell could possibly be thinking of marrying Katty? He found the notion intolerable. Then came a strange turn to the situation. Katty had gone away, on one of those tiresome little visits she was so fond of paying, and Providence, which means women, especially any woman placed in an ambiguous position, to stay quietly at home, had caught her out! She had fallen ill, when on a visit, of scarlet fever, and she had been compelled to stay away six weeks. During those weeks he, Godfrey Pavely, and Oliver Tropenell had become friends--on more intimate terms of friendship than Pavely had ever expected to find himself with any man. This was, of course, partly owing to the fortunate fact that Laura liked Oliver too, and didn't seem to mind how often he came and went to The Chase. But Godfrey Pavely had a tenacious memory. He did not forget that for a little while, at any rate, Oliver had seemed to enjoy being in Katty's company. And when Laura, more than once since Mrs. Winslow's return to Rosedean, had suggested asking Katty in to dinner to meet Oliver, her husband coldly vetoed the proposal. CHAPTER VII Only Harber, the woman who, after having been maid to Katty during her troubled married life, had stayed on with her as house-parlourmaid and general factotum, was aware of how very often Mr. Pavely called at Rosedean on his daily walk home from Pewsbury. To-day he had hardly pressed the bell-knob before the front door opened. It was almost as if Harber had been waiting for him in the hall.