“I have been busy,” he began, and then stopped with a sense of hypocrisy. “I mean worried and tormented,” and then stopped again, for Drake had dropped his head. She laughed, though there was nothing to laugh at, and proposed tea, rattling along in broken sentences that were spoken with a tremulous trill, which had a suggestion of tears behind it. “Shall I ring for tea, Rosa? Oh, you _have_ rung for tea! Ah, here it comes!--Thank you, Liza. Set it here,” seating herself. “Now who says the 'girl'? Remember?” and then more laughter. At that moment there was another arrival. It was Lord Robert Ure. He kissed Rosa's hand, smiled on Glory, saluted Drake familiarly, and then settled himself on a low stool by the tea-table, pulled up the knees of his trousers, relaxed the congested muscles of one half of his face, and let fall his eyeglass. Drake was handing out the cups as Glory filled them. He was looking at her attentively, vexed at the change in her manner since John Storm entered. When he returned to his seat on the sofa he began to twitch the ear of her pug, which lay coiled up asleep beside him, calling it an ugly little pestilence, and wondering why she carried it about with her. Glory protested that it was an angel of a dog, whereupon he supposed it was now dreaming of paradise--listen!--and then there were audible snores in the silence, and everybody laughed, and Glory screamed. “I declare, on my honour, my dear,” said Drake with a mischievous look at John, “the creature is uglier than the beast that did the business on the day we eloped.” “Eloped!” cried Rosa and Lord Robert together. “Why, did you never hear that Glory eloped with me?” Glory was trying to drown his voice with hollow laughter. “She was seven and I was six and a half, and she had proposed to me in the orchard the day before!” “Anybody have more tea? No? Some sally-lunn, perhaps?” and then more laughter. “Hold your tongue, Glory! Nobody wants your tea! Let us hear the story,” said Rosa. “Why, yes, certainly,” said Lord Robert, and everybody laughed again. “She was all for travel and triumphal processions in those days----” Glory stopped her ears and began to sing: Willy, Willy Wilkin, Kissed the maid a-milkin'! Fa, la la! “There were so many things people could do if they wouldn't waste so much time working----” Willy, Willy Wilkin Kissed the maid---- “Glory, if you don't be quiet we'll turn you out!” and Rosa got up and nourished her proofs. “I had brought my dog, and when I called her a----” But Glory had leaped to her feet and fled from the room. Drake had leaped up also, and now, putting his back against the door, he raised his voice and went on with his story. “Somebody saved us, though, and she lay in his arms and kissed him all the way home again.”