Philip's grave face slowly relaxed into a smile. He hardly ever laughed, but his smile was very complete. "I shall tell him you said that," he remarked. Mrs. Home sat down with quite a thump at the horror of the thought. "Dear Philip," she said, "you mustn't--you really mustn't." He stretched out his hand to her. "Oh, mother," he said, "what will cure you of being so indiscreet except threats, and putting those threats into execution if necessary? He will want to take off all his clothes, as we all shall, if it goes on being so hot. Only he won't any more than we shall. He will probably be extremely well-dressed. No, the Hermit is only the Hermit at the Hermitage. Even there he doesn't take off all his clothes, though he lives an outdoor life. You never quite have recognised what a remarkable person he is." "I should remark him anywhere," said Mrs. Home in self-defence. "And what age is he, Philip? Is he twenty, or thirty, or what?" Philip considered. "He must be a year or two older than me," he said. "Yes, I should say he was thirty-one. But it's quite true--he doesn't look any age; he looks ageless. Entirely the result of no clothes and cabbages." "They always seem to me so tasteless," remarked Mrs. Home. "But they seem to suit him." "Dear old Hermit!" said Philip. "I haven't seen him for a whole year. It becomes harder and harder to get him away from his beloved forest." "I can never understand what he does with himself, year in, year out, down there," said Mrs. Home. "He thinks," said Philip. "I should call that doing nothing," remarked his mother. "I know; there is that view of it. At the same time, it must be extremely difficult to think all day. I have been thinking for an hour, and I have quite finished. I should have had to begin to read if you hadn't come out. And whom else are you frightened of out of all these terrible people?" Mrs. Home smoothed her grey gown a little nervously. "I am frightened of Lady Ellington," she said. "She has so very much--so very much self-possession. She is so practical, too: she always tells me all sorts of ways of managing the house, and suggests all kinds of improvements. It is very kind of her, and she is always quite right. And I think I am a little afraid of Madge." "Ah, I can't permit that," said Philip, smiling again. This brought their talk at once into more intimate lands. "Ah, dear Philip," she said. "I pray God that it may go well with you!" Philip sat upright in his chair, and the book fell unheeded to the ground. "How did you guess?" he said. "I suspect you of being a witch, mother; and if we had lived a few hundred years ago, instead of now, it would have been my painful duty to have had you burned. It would have hurt you far more than me, because the sense of duty would have sustained me. I never said a word to you about Madge, yet you knew I was in love with her, I think, almost before I knew it myself."