“But my dear, there is a tray all ready for you, and I was just going to send your dinner upstairs.” “I know you were, and you are very sweet and kind, but I’ve got an odd failing about meals. I simply can’t eat, however hungry I am, if I’m alone. It’s quite terrible, you know,” looking abnormally serious. “I might be ready to eat myself with hunger, and if I’m all alone I couldn’t take one single bite.” “A lucky thing for yourself,” laughed Colonel Masterman, “though not, perhaps, for anyone who chanced to be with you—for you’d be quite certain to begin on them first.” “It would depend upon who it was, and if they were nice and plump.” “Oh, my dear,” exclaimed Mrs Masterman in a shocked voice; “what a dreadful idea!” “Then we’ll change the subject,” said Paddy, adding roguishly, “Do you like picture post-cards, Mr Masterman?” “I think people are very wanting in taste and very out-of-date who don’t,” he answered promptly; “but perhaps in an out-of-the-way place like this you have not yet seen many?” “On the contrary,” sweetly, “we have seen so many that we are positively sick of the very sight of them. I’m thinking of starting a society, like the one in New York, for suppressing the tune called ‘Hiawatha,’ only mine will be directed against the post-card craze.” “But I think they are so beautiful,” said Mrs Masterman, looking up from her plate with a puzzled expression. “Really! sometimes I can hardly tear myself away from Linton’s, they have such beautiful specimens.” “No? Well, you must take Mr Masterman with you to-morrow. He’ll simply love it, and he won’t know how to tear himself away either. Colonel Masterman will have to come by the next train to try and lure you both home again.” Ted Masterman’s expression had a “wait-till-I-catch-you” air, but she only went off into an airy description of her youthful admirer on the tennis court, which lasted until the two elder ones retired to their books, leaving her and Ted to amuse each other over their coffee in the conservatory. Paddy at once opened fire with a cross-examination. “So you live in London?” she remarked; “seems to me one might as well live in a coal mine.” “Oh, come! that’s rather strong; London is a grand place.” “It’s a good thing you think so, since you live there. I loathe the very name of it.” “But why?” “Why? Everything’s why. Look at the dirt, and the smoke, and the smuts,” in a tone of unutterable disgust. “On a fine day the poor sun struggles to shine through the atmosphere, and only succeeds in giving a pale, sickly glow, and on a wet day the clouds appear to literally rest on the house-tops and rain-smuts. If you look up, you see nothing but roofs and chimneys, and if you look down, you see nothing but paving-stones and basements, and if you look round generally, you see little else but pale, sickly, tired people all trampling on each other to live.” “Didn’t you ever look in the shops?”