'But I am not going without you,' returned her husband good-naturedly. 'Your mother would not want me, my dear, under those circumstances. We will stay at home, like Darby and Joan, by our own ingle-side.' 'Oh, then you can ask the Drummonds,' went on Geraldine, in a relieved voice. 'Audrey ought to have reminded you of them, but she seems to think only of the Blakes. I suppose you will be obliged to ask Mr. Blake, too, mother?' 'Yes, certainly, my dear. Mrs. Blake would not like to come without her son. It will be a large party, but----' 'Well, it cannot be helped, I suppose; but Percy and I think it is rather a pity----' Here Geraldine gave a slight cough, warned by a look from her husband. 'What is a pity, my dear?' 'Oh, it does not matter--at least, Percy does not wish me to speak.' 'Geraldine is rather like the dog in the manger,' interrupted Mr. Harcourt. 'Because I will not let her come to your dinner-party, she would rather you did not have one at all. That is it, isn't it, Jerry?' Mrs. Ross smiled benevolently at this little sally. She liked to hear her son-in-law's jokes. She never joked Geraldine herself, and so she seldom saw that girlish blush that was so becoming. When she had taken her leave, Geraldine said to her husband: 'Why did you stop me just now when I was dropping that hint about Mr. Blake?' 'Because I thought the hint premature, my dear,' he returned drily, 'and because it is not our place to warn Mr. Blake off the premises; he is not the first young man, and I do not expect he will be the last, to admire Audrey.' 'But, Percy, I am quite sure that Mr. Blake is too handsome and too attractive altogether to be a harmless admirer.' 'Pooh! nonsense, my love. Don't let your imagination run away with you. Audrey is too sensible a girl to let herself fall in love with a young fellow like Blake. Now shall I go on with our book?' For that day Geraldine was considered an invalid, and as her husband thought fit to indulge and make much of her, she was not so sure she disliked her passing indisposition, any more than Mr. Harcourt disliked playing Darby to his handsome Joan. The dinner-party passed off well, and Mrs. Blake looked so lovely in her new gown that she made quite a sensation, and the Vicar observed to his wife afterwards 'that she was the nicest and most agreeable woman he had met for a long time.' Mrs. Boyle received this eulogium a little coldly. She was a fat, dumpy little person, with a round, good-natured face that had once been pretty. 'Bernard might admire Mrs. Blake,' she said to herself,--'she was the sort of woman men always raved about; but for her part she was not sure she admired her style,' but she had the rare magnanimity to keep her opinions to herself. Mrs. Boyle never contradicted her husband after the peevish manner of some wives.