"You are very sweet," Lena whispered again, and stroked her shoulder. "You remember Mr. Farley, don't you, dear?" "Oh yes," Margaret said, shaking hands with him. "He is staying with us till Monday morning," Mrs. Lakeman explained. "Then we are all going back together, very early, indeed, in order to catch the Scotch express from Euston." "It's not a long stay," Mrs. Vincent said, with the restraint in her manner that was always impressive. "The place is worth a longer one. You will come to think so." "I dare say, but we must start for Scotland on Monday, and, as I never can travel at night, we must leave here in the morning and go up to town by the eight o'clock train in order to catch the day express. Tom Carringford is coming over to-morrow afternoon"--and she looked up at Margaret with a smile--"to dine and sleep. He is at Frencham now, dear boy; but he said he must come and spend to-morrow evening with us and go up and see us off in the morning." She wished Margaret to understand distinctly that Tom belonged to them. "Is he going to Scotland, too?" Margaret asked, rather lamely, for lack of something else to say. "Not with us. He is so disappointed, dear boy, at not being able to get away, but he comes to us in a week or two." She stopped for a moment and turned impulsively to Mrs. Vincent. "But I want to talk about Gerald," she said. "He told you of his visit to us? It was years since I had seen him-- Mr. Farley wanted to meet him so much, too," she broke off to add, always careful to include every one in the room in her talk. "They ought to have gone to see him, of course--he had a magnificent part; but Gerald would take Margaret to 'King John'. He thought it would educate her more and amuse her less, I suppose." "Is Mr. Farley an actor?" Hannah asked. "Dawson, that ought to take it out of you!" Mrs. Lakeman laughed. "There's one place in the world, at any rate, where they haven't heard of you." And then turning to Hannah, she said, impressively, "He is the greatest romantic actor in England, Miss Barton." "It's a thing I am not likely to have heard," Hannah answered. "I have never entered a theatre, or wished to enter one." Lena made a little sound of sympathy. "I always like the Puritans," she said. "They were so self-denying." "I'm a very wicked person, perhaps," Dawson Farley said, with pleasant cynicism, that almost won Hannah in spite of herself. "But all the same, won't you show us your garden, Miss Barton?" It seemed to him sheer insanity to come to the country and stay in-doors. "I wish you young people would all go to the garden. I want to talk to this dear woman alone, and we have only a quarter of an hour to stay," Mrs. Lakeman said. "You'll take a cup of tea?" Mrs. Vincent asked, for it always seemed to her that a visit was a poor thing unless it included refreshment.