Horace met a friend at his club, with whom he dined. It was late when he got back to his own rooms. He opened the door of the studio to see what progress the workmen had made. The room presented a forlorn appearance. The carpets were up, and the furniture was covered with sheets; all about the floor were paint-pots, shavings, and workmen’s tools. A writing-table stood apart in the window; Horace bethought himself of a sketch-book which he had left somewhere about, perhaps in one of the drawers. The top drawer was unlocked, and as he pulled it open he saw a heap of letters and advertisements which had accumulated during his absence. He had opened a great many of them, leaving the rest to a more favourable opportunity. It occurred to him now that the opportunity had arrived. He lighted a cigarette, dragged a chair from a corner of the room, and began tearing up circulars and invitations to parties that had taken place weeks ago; they would have to be answered some day, not now. At last he came upon some bills, and underneath these a grey envelope. He opened it leisurely. The letter was dated, “February 2nd”—the day before he had gone abroad. “Dear Mr. Meade,—Please come and see me. I have made a mistake.—Yours truly, EMBRANCE CLEMON.” He read it over and over again, turned it backwards and forwards, then he put it down with a sigh. It must have been written shortly after that conversation in the park that he had been trying to forget. It was an apology—a direct appeal to him—and he had taken no notice of it! Nay, worse than that! With a groan, he pushed away the candle and rested his head on his hands, exclaiming, “And _I_ have been advising her to go to New Zealand!” Never had the backward pupil seemed so backward as she did that day. She had made twelve mistakes in a simple dictation; she had written an essay on Catherine of Arragon, whom she persistently confused with Catherine of Medici; and she had worked her sums on a method of her own, involving one direct certainty—that the answers could not by any possibility be correct. Embrance succeeded in concealing her vexation, and the two hours’ lesson ended more happily than might have been expected. The girl (who was good as gold, though not gifted with a taste for study) helped her dear Miss Clemon into her ulster, and let her out of the hall-door, with many injunctions that she was to take a cab if she got tired, or if it rained too fast.