"Yet you condemn poor Paul to a life-long connection with that young bounder. Upon my soul! you women are queer creatures;" and the perversity of the feminine nature appeared to absorb him for the rest of the evening. Even Mrs. Vane, who ventured down to dinner for the first time, could make nothing of the ghastly function, so she retired immediately afterwards on plea of being tired, chiefly because she wished to have an opportunity of seeing Marjory alone, which she secured by bidding her in a whisper be sure and come to her room after she had said good-bye to everyone else. Her departure reduced the drawing-room to flat despair. "It is the sadness of farewell," remarked Miss Smith, part of whose contract was that she was to remain to the last and see nothing was forgotten; not even a decent show of sentiment. "Parting is such sweet sorrow," murmured the Major under his moustache. He was the most cheerful of the party, since his flirtation had resulted in another week's grouse shooting with his charmer's father. "Mr. St. Clare has written such a sweet thing called 'Good-bye,'" continued the Moth, appealing to the Poet. "He might recite it to cheer us up." "I wonder how many poets there are who haven't written a piece on that subject," put in Paul, hastily, as Mr. St. Clare gave a preliminary cough, "and yet it will supply tons of agony to generations still unborn." "There are forty songs of that name," remarked Alice, practically. "I wanted one for a friend, and the music man told me so." Then the remembrance of that friend, a certain young fellow with a pleasant baritone voice, busy over tallow at Riga, gave her quite a pang of regret. "Mostly trash, too," assented the Major; "Tosti's is the best, but even there one is all battered to pieces before the end." "That is true," put in Marjory, eagerly. "You see, the poet begins by fine-drawing the agony, the composer follows suit, and the singer carries out the distortion. So in the third verse there is nothing for it but to 'kill the coo.'" "I haven't heard 'Auld Robin Gray' for twenty years," murmured Lord George. "No one sings anything but German nowadays. German or comic operas." "Miss Carmichael sings Scotch songs; I've heard her," said Paul from the skein of silk he was holding for Alice Woodward. "Oh, do!" cried the Moth. "Something touching." "Somethin' to cheer us up, you mean," put in Sam; "somethin' with a chorus, you know." "Something old-fashioned," protested Lord George. "Something appropriate to the occasion," suggested his wife. "Something Miss Carmichael approves of," came from the skein of silk. The girl stood by the piano for an instant, looking at them all with a touch of fine scorn in her face. "I will do my best," she said at last, with a laugh. The next instant, with a crash of chords, her clear, fresh, young voice rang through the room in that gayest and saddest of songs:--