When Lois and Blanche had managed to give some intelligible account of their adventures, Paul Desfrayne was obliged to undergo a fresh shower of thanks, which were most distasteful to him. “How can I contrive to escape?” he was asking himself, when Lady Quaintree startled him by saying: “And we must really insist on your staying to dinner, Captain Desfrayne. You would catch your death of cold if you were to go out again while this heavy rain lasts.” The young man started back. “You are very kind, madam,” he murmured. “But I--I could not stay, I assure you.” “Come, sir, I must exercise an old woman’s authority, and forbid you to leave us,” cried Lady Quaintree laughingly. “Your mother is, I may say, an old friend of mine, and I could not answer to her if her son met with any mishap on leaving any house where I might be supposed to have a voice. We owe you the safety of these wilful girls, and you must allow us to see to your welfare. If the rain does not abate, you must not ride back, but, if you refuse to honor us by remaining under this roof for the night, must accept the use of one of the carriages in the coach-house.” Lady Quaintree was playing against her own interests; but common charity would not have permitted her to let a dog go out in that sullen, dashing, persistent rain. Paul Desfrayne looked at the disheartening prospect from the windows, and resigned himself to his fate. Without, all looked so dismal and forbidding--out _there_, where his evil past lay crouching, ever ready to spring up and confront him. Within here all seemed so soft and inviting with this white and gold, and velvet couches, and flowers in rich profusion, and these dulcet-toned, high-bred women, symbolic of the brilliant, tempting present, which beckoned to him, sirenlike. “You are very kind--too kind, madam,” he said, bowing low, and speaking in a constrained, husky voice. So it was settled he should dine with them; and the girls went away to change their dresses. Mama Dormer had brought a small portmanteau over in the carriage with her, containing “a few things” required by Blanche during her brief stay. Lois being in black did not need much alteration in her attire, but by means of a trained, black skirt, and a thin, high, white bodice, and a suite of jet ornaments, she contrived to make an effective dinner-costume. By the time they rustled back to the drawing-room, where the little party was to assemble for dinner, the servants were lighting the wax tapers, causing a soft glitter to illuminate the apartment. The rain had ceased. The sultry heat began to come back, and all the windows had been thrown open, admitting the luscious odors of the countless flowers in the gardens. The scent of the summer roses was almost overcoming after the rain. The last, dying rays of the setting sun dyed the sky, from which all but a few floating, feathery clouds had vanished away.