"Oh, do go, Dick," giving him a little impatient push in her agitation; "if your mother wants you, you must not keep her waiting." But Nan in her heart knew, as Dick did in his, that the message was only a subterfuge to separate them. CHAPTER V. "I AM QUITE SURE OF HIM." Nan would willingly have effected her escape too, but she was detained by the flowers that Dick had tossed so lightly into her lap. She was rather dismayed at her position, and her fingers trembled a little over their work. There was a breath--a sudden entering current--of antagonism and prejudice that daunted her. Lady Fitzroy cast an admiring look at the girl as she sat there with glowing cheeks and downcast lids. "How pretty she is!" she said, in a low voice, as Mr. Mayne pointed out his favorite orchid. "She is like her mother; there is just the same quiet style, only I suspect Mrs. Challoner was even better looking in her time." "Humph! yes, I suppose so," returned her host, in a dissatisfied tone. He had not brought Lady Fitzroy there to talk of the Challoners, but to admire his orchids. Then he shot another glance at Nan between his half-closed eyes, and a little spice of malice flavored his next words. "Shall we sit here a moment? Let me see: you were asking me, Lady Fitzroy, about Dick's prospects. I was talking to his mother about them the other day. I said to her then, Dick must settle in life well; he must marry money." "Indeed?" replied Lady Fitzroy, somewhat absently; she even indulged in a slight yawn behind her fan. She liked Dick well enough, as every one else did, but she was not partial to his father. How tiresome it was of Fitzroy to insist so much on their neighborly duties! Mr. Mayne was not "one of them," as she would have phrased it; he did not speak their language or lead their life; their manners and customs, their little tricks and turns of thought were hieroglyphics to him. A man who had never had a grandfather,--at least a grandfather worth knowing,--whose father's hands had dabbled in trade,--actually trade,--such a one might be a very worthy man, an excellent citizen, an exemplary husband and father, but it behooved a woman in her position not to descend too freely to his level. "Percival is such a sad Radical," she would say to herself; "he does not make sufficient distinction between people. I should wish to be neighborly, but I cannot bring myself to be familiar with these Maynes;" which was perhaps the reason why Lady Fitzroy was not as popular at Longmead and in other places as her good-natured husband. "Oh, indeed?" she said, with difficulty repressing another slight yawn behind her fan, but speaking in a fatigued voice: but Mr. Mayne was too intent on his purpose to notice it. "If Dick had brothers and sisters it would not matter so much; but when one has only a single hope--eh, Lady Fitzroy?--things must be a little different then."