"Always Mr. Roy! I am sick of his very name," muttered David, and then caught Miss Williams by the dress as she was rising. She had a gentle but rather dignified way with her of repressing bad manners in young people, either by perfect silence, or by putting the door between her and them. "Don't go! One never can get a quiet word with you, you are always so preternaturally busy." It was true. To be always busy was her only shield against--certain things which the young man was never likely to know, and would not understand if he did know. "Do sit down, if you ever can sit down, for a minute," said he, imploringly; "I want to speak to you seriously, very seriously." She sat down, a little uneasy. The young fellow was such a good fellow; and yet he might have got into a scrape of some sort. Debt, perhaps, for he was a trifle extravagant; but then life had been all roses to him. He had never known a want since he was born. "Speak, then, David; I am listening. Nothing very wrong, I hope!" said she, with a smile. "Nothing at all wrong, only--When is Mr. Roy going away"? The question was so unexpected that she felt her color changing a little; not much, she was too old for that. "Mr. Roy leaving St. Andrews, you mean? How can I tell? He has never told me. Why do you ask?" "Because until he gone, I stay," said the young man, doggedly. "I'm not going back to Oxford leaving him master of the field. I have stood him as long as I possibly can, and I'll not stand him any longer." "David! you forget yourself." "There--now you are offended; I know you are, when you draw yourself up in that way, my dear little auntie. But just hear me. You are such an innocent woman, you don't know the world as men do. Can't you see--no, of course you can't--that very soon all St. Andrews will be talking about you?" "About me?" "Not about you exactly, but about the family. A single man--a marrying man, as all the world says he is, or ought to be, with his money--can not go in and out, like a tame cat, in a household of women, without having, or being supposed to have--ahem!--intentions. I assure you"--and he swung himself on the arm of her chair, and looked into her face with an angry earnestness quite unmistakable--"I assure you, I never go into the club without being asked, twenty times a day, which of the Miss Moseleys Mr. Roy is going to marry." "Which of the Miss Moseleys Mr. Roy is going to marry!" She repeated the words, as if to gain time and to be certain she heard them rightly. No fear of her blushing now; every pulse in her heart stood dead still; and then she nerved herself to meet the necessity of the occasion. "David, you surely do not consider what you are saying. This is a most extraordinary idea."